A magical game of Truth or Dare
by my-little-quill
Summary: Set in the Marauders seventh year and the group of ten Gryffindors decide to play a game of 'Truth or Dare'. But this is no ordinary game; it has certain rules, and obviously Magic is involved to ensure this. The Game will last continuously for one month. Read through the humour, romance, parties, heartbreak, secrets, veritaserum, Valentines Day and unexpected twists.
1. A Muggle thing

A Magical Game of Truth or Dare

Chapter One: _a Muggle thing_

_'The power of doing anything with quickness is always prized much by the possessor, and often without any attention to the imperfection of the performance-'_

"Come on Lily, it's Sunday!" cried Hestia, creeping up on her unsuspecting friend.

Lily was snuggled up against her favourite reading perch – the infamous Willow tree – and visibly jumped at the shrill voice, which had interrupted the empty school grounds, causing several robins to whisk themselves away.

"Geesh, next time, would you mind giving a girl a warning? You know, I don't quite fancy having a heart attack just yet- I'm not even of age."

"You will be by this time next week, Lils! We're going to throw you the best party that Hogwarts has and will ever know!"

"I guess it's lucky that I'm head girl then, isn't it? Who else would have been able to ensure that the Hogsmeade trip falls on their birthday?" Lily smirked, turning fondly to face her eternally dexterous best friend. "Anyway, we both know full well that party planning is not why you're here. There's no way you'd risk your hair in the January weather just for that. Cut to the chase. I was just becoming reacquainted with my beloved Mr Darcy."

"Well-" Hestia begun, wrinkling her nose as usual at Lily's choice of words. "Who?"

"Pride and Prejudice..?" stated Lily as though it was obvious, and then sighing as she recognised Hestia's common confused tone. "Classic muggle book."

"Oh, okay... but my point is that Sundays are for either sleeping away hangovers or for socialising- but they are most definitely not for studying."

"I'm not studying Hest, it's a book- as in fiction. Maybe you should try it some time."

"Hey, I read books!"

"Witch Weekly doesn't count."

"Stop changing the subject. You shouldn't waste your youth staring at flimsy pieces of paper- it's already six o'clock and I for one am extremely bored- Marlene ditched me a couple of hours ago for some new fitness training thingamabob that Potter has probably imperiused the whole Quidditch team doing," Hestia stopped to take a breath. "My point, is that it is your job - as my very best friend - to satisfy my needs."

"I thought Sirius had the whole satisfying your needs thing covered," Smirked Lily cannily. "What even are you two nowadays? Same old broom-closet-buddies? I know that's where you disappear to at night."

"You- are- go- ing- to –come- with- me- whether - you - like it or not!" Hestia exclaimed, completely unfazed by Lily's remark, huffing and puffing as she dragged her perpetuity stubborn friend to standing position. "Do not make me hex you, Lily Evans."

"Fine," Lily sighed, brushing down her robes and grabbing her satchel. "I'll have you know, I'm bound to feel pretty claustrophobic in broom cupboards, but if you like it like that..."

Hestia stepped back as Lily practically skipped away into the evening, slightly put-out for a minute, processing what had just been said. She chuckled to herself and shook her head, deciding that she never really would get used to her best friend's witty antics. She spotted Lily's fiery auburn hair as it flew around a corner, and scampered after it, thankful to be out of the cold.

"You know," Hestia began nonchantly, panting slightly as she caught up to Lily, and began to stride alongside her. "Sirius never feels claustrophobic. He has really great stamina too. It must come naturally with being a beater. I mean, when we're really going at it, he'll just let out these little short pants, the sexy little breaths you know? Not like some of those loud moans that some guys do. I swear Diggory thinks it's foxy, but it's not, seriously, he just sounds like a porn star."

"Seriously Hest! There's a crowd of fifth years in Gryffindor common room who would be more than willing to hear you out, but if you continue with that sentence I assure you that you will be mopping up my breakfast."

o.O

"Have you guys ever heard of truth or bare?" ask Mary, bringing her dorm-mates out of their bored stupor. "I heard some of the students at my dad's university talking about it at the Winter Lecture that he took me to. It sounded pretty fun."

The seventh year girls were sprawled across their dormitory in Gryffindor tower in some poses which would make their divination teacher proud. Professor Woodward made them do some ridiculous stretches at the beginning of each lesson, as she thought that 'a relaxed body means a relaxed mind'. She made no sense whatsoever, and Mary was relieved to drop it at the end of their fifth year. Mary McDonald was half-blood, yet in a sense she was as much muggle as Lily was, having grown up in a Muggle Suburb in West Yorkshire, England. She had lived with her muggle father, and she loved him dearly.

Mary had never attended her local primary school as every other child on her street did, as it was simply too dangerous, what with Mary's underage magic literally exploding out of her at the worst possible times. Her father, being non-magical had never truly known what to do with her, but as he himself was a tutor at the different universities in their county, and after going through countless despairing nannies, he eventually decided that his best bet would be to take her along with him instead, where he could keep an eye on her.

Mary would lounge around all day, and so naturally she became particularly knowledgeable in the arts of Mathematics and Chemistry, the two subjects her father specialised in. These served her well in her OWLs, as she gained Outstanding's in Arithmancy and Potions, and mostly Exceed Expectations in everything academical. The subjects that Mary wasn't so good at was more hands on subjects, like Herbology and Divination. Yet she still passed every OWL. Mary was happy with this, and intended to do the same on her NEWTs, and so had been trying to work hard all year. This was a rarity that she had some free time, and she wanted to have some fun with her friends.

"Well I would, but not all of us have inside knowledge to the weird workings of a Muggle mind." Alice Prewett, a clumsy but loveable girl asked, motioning in circles to herself and Hestia, both of whom were had grown up around Wizards- Alice being pureblood and Hestia half. "Fancy filling us in here?"

"I think she means Truth or _Dare_," Lily corrected, giggling. "We used to play it occasionally back when I went to my Muggle primary. I remember it being very funny to a group of rowdy Year Fives."

"Yeah," snorted Hestia. "And when have you, little miss perfect, ever been considered 'rowdy'?"

Lily lunged at Hestia, who immediately started shrieking and screaming, causing Mary to cover her ears and Alice to wince. Lily wasn't bothered by it though and raised her arms in what seemed to be a threatening way, before digging them into Hestia's elaborate updo and messing it all up.

"Do carry on, Mary," Lily said, grinning as she sat back down on her own bed...

"Well it's pretty simple," Mary explained, once the laughter had died down. "We take it in turns to choose either truth or dare. If you choose truth then the rest of the group ask you a question, to which you must answer honestly. Hence the name. If you pick dare, then you must fulfil something that the other players dare you to do. Right, Lily?"

"Why must you do the dare?" asked Hestia, obviously trying to find some unforeseen loophole.

"Because those are the rules." Lily replied firmly.

"Well, I'm up for it," Grinned Alice, rubbing her hands together. "Who wants to go first? Nobody? I vote Hestia."

"What! Why me?" Hestia cried.

"You're the eldest." Shrugged Alice.

"That is so not fair." Hestia tried, but she was overruled by Mary and Lily.

"I disagree, I think it's pretty fair to be honest." Stated Mary with a sly wink at her friend.

It was only when she felt comfortable that Mary ever came out of her shell properly, and the truth was that she never really felt comfortable around most people. It had taken two years and a lot of persistence on Alice's behalf to get Mary to open up to them, to let her hair down, to trust them not to poke fun at her, or judge her, just simply be there for her and enjoy their company, solely as friends. They all knew Mary must have had a good reason for not trusting anybody enough to be herself around them. The three of them had made some pretty half-hearted attempts to get Mary to confide in them, but in the end all that happened was that Mary would get upset and close up again, and so all of the girls had learnt not to ask. They didn't want her to recoil back into her shell like a snail again.

"You would say that!" Cried Hestia. "Your birthday is in July!"

"Blame my parents," She shrugged, earning a raised eyebrows and a small choked giggle from Alice.

"You'd have thought somebody who's in a steady relationship of two-and-a-bit- years would have a bit of a higher maturity level than that." Lily chuckled, poking Alice in the stomach, making her giggle.

"Speaking of which," Hestia begun, her big blue eyes sparkling. "You and Frankie-boy- have you ever, you know-"

Alice squirmed uncomfortably on her bed, on which they were all perched, lying in various positions. She threw a badly aimed pillow at Hestia, which missed its target completely and instead hit an unfortunate box of Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans, sending them reeling into every nook and cranny of the room.

"Thank Merlin for that," Lily grinned. Her hatred of those beans was well known, ever since the Marauders had used this against her in a prank around Christmas of third year. When asked why she disliked the sweets so much, Lily often replied with something about the unpredictability of them, and how it was pointless when you could otherwise have a box of Jelly Beans with flavours of your choice. It made sense really, at least to her.

Alice was obviously thinking along those lines; "Do you guys remember that time when the Maraud-"

"Yes, yes, we all remember." Brushed off Hestia. "But you, my friend, are not getting out of this one. Have you and Frank ever 'done the deed'?"

Alice blushed and opened her mouth to say something, but Hestia cut in front of her again.

"And don't you even bother saying 'no' to this one. You two have been best friends since you were born, flirting and crushing on each other since your hormones kicked in, dating for what, two, three years now?"

"On top of that, he tells you sincerely that he loves you every night before you separate, you trust him, and I quote 'more than anyone else in the world'-" Continued Lily.

"You're very pretty Alice, in an innocent way, which I guess would be good for role play," Hestia pointed out, acknowledging that Alice was turning purple from embarrassment. "And hell, you cannot deny that puberty has treated that boy well. So please, feel free to continue." Hestia crossed one leg over the other and sat up straight, looking expectantly at Alice.

Alice genuinely had no reply to that. She was no prude but she knew Frank wouldn't want her sharing their secrets, and neither did she. It was too private, too special, too vulnerable a thing to go waving about. It was theirs, something only the two of them shared, and although neither had said anything specifically about keeping it to themselves, they knew each other so well, it was a given really. So instead of forming words, Alice simply opened and closed her mouth a few times, like a fish.

After several long seconds of this, sensing her discomfort Mary stepped in. "Save it for the game, shall we?"

Alice shot Mary a grateful look, making a mental note to select dare for her next few goes.

"So Hestia, enough of the prolonging. Truth or dare?" Alice asked, her blush fading away rapidly as they begun the game.

"Let's take it easy for the first one, yeah? Truth."

Lily's eyes lit up immediately, a gesture that Hestia knew from impatiently waiting for Lily whilst she was studying was bound to be an idea. She didn't like it.

"Hestia Jones, seeing as you avoided my question earlier on, what are your intentions with our dearest Sirius?"

"Erm, Sirius Black?" Hestia tried.

"The one and only."

"You know, by saying 'intentions', you're hinting that I'm only using him?"

"Well, aren't you?"

"Humph." Replied Hestia, stumped. "Touché"

"So..?" Pressed Alice.

"So what?"

"Answer the question, woman!"

"But I don't understand what you're asking," Hestia whined.

'What you plan on doing with him, how long you plan on using him for, the extent of your feelings for him, et cetera. . ."

"We're just ... friends with benefits?" Hestia stated, voice creeping up the Sopranos. It only became higher in pitch when she was either lying or trying to hide something.

"Lies," sang Lily.

"No I'm not, we are only broom-closet-buddies, as you so kindly put it Lily." Hestia sighed, looking down, clicking her bright pink manicured nails against one another.

"But you're not content with that, are you Hest?" asked Mary quietly. It was strange, how Mary worked. She was often timid and trying to stay out of the limelight, but when she spoke she had a deeming quality that made everybody pipe down and listen to her, and she didn't even know. Even though Mary wasn't loud and controlling you just couldn't help but try to listen, for she was very insightful.

"Okay if I answer your specified questions, can we just leave it at that?" Hestia asked sharply, making it obvious that anybody who tried to continue with the subject would regret it. "I plan on going all the way with him. Merlin knows he'll be great in bed, and hey, I'm a hormonal teenage girl-"

"But-" began Alice, obviously confused.

"Before you ask, of course he's up for it, he's made that much obvious, but I have to make him work for it, don't I?" She said with a cheeky wink. "The second and third part to your question is where things get confusing… for me at least. I don't really see myself as using him, although it sure started out that way - for both of us, I'm sure. My feelings for him? Nothing more than lust..? Or at least, that's how it used to be… all I know is that he's hilarious, good company and a good kisser. Scratch that. Great kisser. Usually you only get one."

"Has our little Hestia, dare I say it, developed_ feelings_ for a boy?" Alice asked, feigning a gasp of shock.

"Hey, that's technically your fifth question." Hestia replied, attempting and failing to make her voice lower again. "It's payback time now. But no, you know I don't do relationships . . . Alice, your birthday is in April, right? And little Mary's is in July- lucky thing. So that means Lily, truth or dare, my dear friend?"

"I am so going to regret this but . . . dare."

Her three dorm mates squatted together, whispering intently whilst Lily leaned back against the head board of Alice's' bed and wondered what on earth had compelled her to pick dare - playing with Hestia of all people.

She turned her head lazily and looked around the dormitory. It was circular shaped, which was obvious since they were all in Gryffindor tower, with a big circular heater in the centre of the room. Mary and Marlene's bed were situated about five feet apart, one on each side of the door. Mary took the other bed next to the door simply because the rest was taken and she really didn't mind. Marlene had chosen her bed 'just to be prepared'. None of the other girls really knew what she meant by that, so they just nodded and smiled, which was what they usually did when it came to Marlene. It had worked out best that she was closest to the door anyway, because she was always dashing in and out, usually with a quaffle, doxy, or something of the sort tucked under her arm. She really was a hectic, crazy type of girl.

Next to Marlene was Alice's bed, on which they were all sat. She and Lily had traded a few years back to prevent Marlene from 'whispering' (more like yelling in a hissing tone) across the room whenever she wanted to communicate with Alice after light's out. It was usually Marlene who did the talking, and Alice never got a word in edgeways, so she just nodded along until she fell asleep and Marlene would continue, talking to herself. Eventually the pair learnt that a tired Lily was not a happy Lily, which would always result in the torture of whoever had the misfortune to be in her presence the next day. The same went for Hestia, who 'needed her beauty sleep', and so Lily offered (demanded) to trade beds.

The two still whispered, although rather more quietly, up until late fourth year, when Severus had taught Lily an unfamiliar spell, 'Muffliato'. She had taught it to the two, and nowadays all she could hear was a faint buzzing noise whenever the two put up the charm. It was better than nothing, Lily supposed.

Next to Alice's bed, in the middle of them all, was Hestia's, which was rather fitting as Hestia thrived off being the centre of attention.

And lastly, between Mary and Hestia was Lily's bed, and unsurprisingly it was the neatest of them all, closely followed by Mary's, then by Hestia's, who had outfits strewn all over it. Next came Marlene's, who, predictably had not even bothered making it, had random pages from school books dotted around, a few odd trainers around, a blue robe lying in a wrinkled pile, a mound of discarded Chocolate Frog wrappers, feathers still there from her pillow, a green… food stain? Presumably from that morning, and various pads from her Quidditch attire- it seemed that Potter hadn't deemed it necessary for them. Lily shook her head fondly at her crazy friend, and turned her attention back to the game, just in time to hear them all coming to a conclusion.

"I can't wait to see the face on Sirius!" shrieked Hestia through her laughing.

"Never mind about him, how d'you reckon Marlene will react?" giggled Mary.

"Care to fill me in here guys?" Lily said, mimicking Alice from earlier on.

"I'd be delighted," she grinned back. "We, dare you, Lily Evans, to . . . spur on the Quidditch players."

"Oh, that's easy." Lily shrugged, thinking how her friends were clearly inexperienced at this game.

"And what we mean by that," continued Hestia. "Is that you have to take that Muggle record player thing or whatever it is, down to the Quidditch Pitch where Gryffindor are training, get on a broom, bop around and play some encouraging song-"

"- I vote 'Let's get physical' by Olivia Newton-John, to be that song," chimed Mary.

"Muggle thing? Yeah sure, whatever," Brushed off Hestia, obviously eager to continue. "And fly around on the broom, with it playing at a magically enhanced volume, circling the players – 'encouraging them' to train."

"The looks on their faces will be hysterical," Alice giggled.

Lily knew that this was potentially going to be pretty funny. Also potentially embarrassing. But she was a proud Gryffindor, and so she was not going to dwell on that. As Mary had pointed out, Marlene would definitely have a funny reaction, and she was one of her best friends. Sirius too, would be funny, and as they were in the eldest year at the school, the look on the younger student's faces would be priceless. She couldn't get too told off for doing so, at least, not enough to ruin her clean detentionless state. Well, that was a lie.

She had had three, just three (!) detentions before, but none were directly her fault. They had all been Potter's and Black's doing. Also, it was Potter who had annoyed her so much that she simply had to throw a teacup at him in divination in their third year.

The two were supposed to be working on a paired assignment, but Lily simply couldn't bear being around him, so they split it in half. Lily was going to write about the theory of them, and although Potter was undeniably smart, Lily noticed he never tried for homework, so she gave him the easier task of writing about an example. Lily didn't have time to read through their work as Potter had shown up late to the lesson, so she stuck them together and handed it in. When they got it back, sure they got a fairly high grade- an Acceptable (not quite Lily's standard, but she could live with it), until she scanned through Potters work and read how his tea leaves showed him and Lily getting married in the close future, and how there would be ten little auburn-coloured, crazy-haired kids running around their shared home. Yes, Potter really had that tea cup coming. It had only taken the matron to a couple of hours to have his pretty little face back to normal.

Unfortunately.

And Black had most definitely had it coming when he almost killed Snape. That had been completely out of order, yet Lily was surprised when Black just let her hex and curse him to her hearts content, he didn't fight back at all. Either way, she would have won the duel. Her and Snape were childhood friends and had always been close friends. Well, up until a few months after that incident; Lily would never forgive him for calling her a mu-

Anyway, her third and final detention to this date had been about two weeks after that incident when Potter had apparently been trying to 'comfort' her, by telling her that Snape had no right, how he was blind if he refused to see past her blood heritage, etc. But Lily had been trying to forget all about it, admittedly a terrible job at it, but Potter had bought it up when it was all so fresh and raw that all of her anger from the incident and her betrayal just boiled up inside of her and she simply couldn't help screaming at him so loudly that several teachers had come to inspect. Okay, maybe that one wasn't Potter's fault. It was slightly hers. But mostly Snape's, now she thought about it.

"Okay, I'll do it. Can I borrow your broom, Hest? Yours is faster than mine." she said slowly, contemplating the dare.

"Sure- it's under my bed. Lily?" Hestia asked curiously. "I don't mind you borrowing mine at all, but I can't help wondering how come you never bothered getting your own broom?"

Lily blushed and muttered something incoherent. The truth was that Lily simply could not afford it, but by answering that question truthfully, so many more would be asked.

Lily hated it, truly she did, lying to her friends, but it was better than the alternative. She could not, never ever, let her friends figure out her biggest secret. She told them most things, but this was simply something that they could not know. She didn't want their pity. Nor did she want them to look at her differently, which was something Lily knew for sure that they would. They already did in a sense, although they tried as hard as they could not to show it. Lily was different to them; muggle born. Everyone knew what that meant in those days and age, what with stories of Voldemort haunting the pages of the Daily Prophet...

The burden of her secret had been weighing on Lily's shoulders since she was only nine years old. Lily had let her life be shaped around her secret, it was the reason she immersed herself so far into her studies, it was why her walls were so often up, it was why she had strived to be head girl; so that she could do well in life, make a name for herself, it was the ultimate reason as to why the Sorting Hat had placed her in Gryffindor instead of Ravenclaw.

When a thought had crossed her eleven year old mind about how she mightn't live up to its glorified reputation, the Hat had said how Lily had most definitely proved herself to be Gryffindor-worthy already.

You see, Lily's beautiful, intelligent, beloved mother, her teasing, strong, cheerful father and her incessantly chuckling, two year old baby brother had all died, been killed, murdered, by a devastating house fire. It had turned their once smiling faces into nothing but ash. Ash which officials had been unable to decipher between bodies and furniture. But Lily could not, **would _not_ **let it define who she was. Or so she tried. Lily shook away the ghosts of her past, and reimbursed herself to the game at hand.

"I'll pretend I heard what you said," Hestia shook off, noticing the common faraway look in Lily's emerald eyes. "But, we're not finished. You're going to do it in your underwear."

Ah. There were the friends Lily knew and, at this moment in time, hated.

"I. Am. Head. Girl!" She exclaimed. "I am not frolicking around the school grounds in my underwear!"

"We don't mean you need to walk through the school in your underwear," Mary attempted. "Just from the moment you start playing the song."

"Absolutely not."

"C'mon Lils, don't be a pansy," chided Hestia.

"I'm not being a 'pansy', but there is no way that Potter, or Black for that matter is going to see me in my knickers and bra."

"Undoubtedly Potter already has – in his dreams at least," giggled Hestia. "So much for being a Gryffindor, Lily."

That stung Lily slightly. She had spent the best past of six years trying to prove to the rest of the school that although she was muggle born, she was damned proud of it and she deserved to be at Hogwarts as much as anyone else did. That loyalty also covered her being a Gryffindor, something which Hestia knew full well.

"How long for?" Lily asked with gritted teeth.

"Just the duration of the song," replied Mary innocently, fighting back her smile. They had won.

Lily grabbed her black Hogwarts robe, and flounced into their en suite bathroom, slamming the door for good measure. She stripped out of her weekend clothes, down to her underwear. Lily wasn't self-conscious of her body, but had never been one to flaunt it. Lily remembered a quote that her deceased mother had once taught her. 'Lovely Lily, you just remember this, if you ever start to like a boy, just remember, you don't need to get his attention; you need to make him vie for your attention.'

But funnily enough most of the boys she had ever felt attracted to suddenly seemed to become the new targets of the Marauders pranks, and so she had never really held onto a boy for too long – they had all been frightened away by Potter, who seemed to think that he had some sort of damn claim over her.

Thinking about it, Potter hadn't really been quite as tiresome in the past year. He had seemed to have grown up quite a bit. He didn't hex random people whom he passed in the corridor anymore, yet he still hadn't lost that mischievous side of him. He and his cronies still played the occasional prank, although they were rarer, although Lily thought regretfully, they were usually on a much grander scale. She had to admit it though, they could be funny. Sometimes. Rarely. Okay, on a weekend perhaps, or maybe outside after lessons. But what really irked Lily, was when the marauders took their pranks into the classroom. She wanted to learn, and the bloody so-called-Marauders assured that the lesson went to waste. It was then that Lily got frustrated. However, since the professors had laid on the work about the NEWTs, the pair had at least acknowledged the workload, and had been at least a teeny bit more responsible. By that, Lily meant that Potter actually took most of his Head boy (Lily still couldn't fathom how on earth he made that role) duties seriously, although, she hastened to add, he had undoubtedly abused the position of authority at least once this year. It was annoying though, how he wasn't as committed to monitoring the halls. He managed to worm himself out of a night duty at least once a month, and whenever he did show up, he was always done within half an hour. It was as if he had some sort of spy which showed him all of the snogging hotspots.

'But then again,' Lily thought snidely. 'He's probably well acquainted with them all.'

Lily looked into the bathroom mirror and inspected herself. She didn't consider herself particularly pretty; her dark red hair and emerald green eyes were too festive for her taste, and it was difficult to find outfits that wouldn't clash. Yet she wasn't ugly either, she was perfectly normal.

She had a slim waist, not toned though, for although Lily enjoyed flying, she dedicated her time more to her studies rather than to sports. She was wearing a simple lilac bra, and she was grateful that she hadn't chosen a more revealing one. Her breasts were perky and a rather average size, a fact that she couldn't bring herself to really care about. Her bottom was fairly rounded, yet not as much as Hestia's toned booty (her pride and joy), and she had short slim legs which she never really flaunted for the fact that she really didn't need to emphasize her height – or lack thereof.

Lily sighed as she shrugged on her robe, the sensible part of her begging her to tell her 'friends' that she was out of the game, but the more adventurous, true Gryffindor part of her was whispering obscenely that if she did this right, then even she might get a kick out of watching Potter's reaction.

She tightened her robe and stepped out of the bathroom, making sure she gave all of her dorm-mates well deserved evil glares, before picking up Hestia's broom in one hand, her mother's old record player in the other, and stalked out of the dormitory. Lily rarely used it anyway, as the Head boy and Girl had a Head Common Room and their own private bedrooms.

Alice, Hestia and Mary soon caught up with Lily, but they were held up by the fact that Alice fell into every trick step on the rotating staircases that they encountered ("Honestly Alice, how does Frank cope with you?" Hestia would ask.), and it was ten to eight by the time the four of them reached the Quidditch Pitch. Much to Lily's disappointment, the team were all still outside, working up a sweat, most of them looking worse for wear, including the energetic Marlene, although she looked to be enjoying herself? Even the fit as can be Sirius Black looked like he wanted to drop dead, and Potter wasn't far behind him, yet they persevered.

Marlene's face brightened up as she waved and called over to her friends, attracting the attention of the whole team. Potter glanced up and nodded acknowledgement in their direction before calling back his squads attention to him. He then made the team start to do fitness exercises which he was clearly the best at; showing off. Lily rolled her eyes and turned back to face her friends, paler than ever, taking in their expressions. Mary was looking anxious, Alice; slightly apprehensive, and Hestia; fighting back giggles.

"I guess we'll just go and sit up there then," grinned Alice, motioning to where Remus was sat doing homework and Peter was sat, pointing things out to Remus who nodded every now and then, clearing not listening to his friend.

Mary blushed at the sight of Remus, and tucked her hair behind her ears, ducking her head. Lily grinned knowingly at her. She obviously liked him a lot, but she would never do anything about it, yet nor would he, for that matter. Marlene and Hestia were completely oblivious to it, but judging by the smug look on Alice's face, she had an inkling too.

She watched with baited breath as they made their way up the stands and approached Remus - Mary lagging nervously behind.

"Here goes nothing," Lily muttered to herself, as she stepped into the shadows. She put her wand to her record player and muttered a spell, whilst swivelling the knob to a volume so that everyone within a fifty feet radius could hear it.

Outside the magic didn't affect the electrical current as much, so the song played fairly smoothly. As the volume cranked up, the Quidditch team looked over in surprise to see it was their head girl playing the unfamiliar song. To everyone's amazement, Lily then shrugged out of her robe and straddled the broom, and began to rise unsteadily into the air.

I'm saying all the things that I know you'll like, makin' good conversation

I gotta handle you just right, you know what I mean

I took you to an intimate restaurant, then to a suggestive movie

There's nothin' left to talk about, unless it's horizontally

Lily was hovering a few feet above the Quidditch team just as the chorus started up. Lily braved a glance down. The youngest players - both girls – had covered their eyes prudently, Marlene was laughing her head off, hollering 'Shake what your mamma gave ya!', and every single male Quidditch player was ogling up at her, as though Christmas had come early, and although Potter's brow was furrowed slightly, he was certainly enjoying the show. Lily was suddenly thankful that she had worn girly boxers that morning otherwise she was sure that they would have been able to see what she had for breakfast. Lily gulped.

Let's get physical, physical, I wanna get physical, let's get into physical

Let me hear your body talk, your body talk, let me hear your body talk

"Come on guys! Weren't you just saying that we weren't to be distracted by anything, James? Yoo hoo, James? Anyone home?" Cried Marlene, waving her hand about in front of James.

"Oh – erm – yes, where was I . . . I . . ." James tried, but yet again failed to form words as the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in his life was circling around him, like his own personal angel.

"Guess I'm taking over then. Boys, get your butts in gear! We even have our own private cheerleader to encourage us now!"

Reluctantly the boys began their work out again, although this time most of them opted for sit ups – anything to look upwards. That was when James finally came round to his senses and realised that it was **his **Lily that they were all fantasising about.

"Press ups! Everybody! I want one hundred before training finishes in five minutes!" He yelled, ignoring the protests. "Come on don't make me-"

"Lily Evans!?" A shrill shriek interrupted James' order. "What on _earth_ do you think you're doing up there? Come down this instant!"

Lily blanched, her heart suddenly dropping to her stomach and doing summersaults.

How had they not known that Madam Hooch was there?! She was going to get in _so_ much trouble for that. She was going to kill Hestia, Alice and Mary. Marlene too, for good measure. Lily lowered herself to the ground, and knew it was a lost cause even bothering to try and hide her burgundy blush. Damn her ginger genes.

"Y-yes, Madam Hooch?"

"What do you think you're playing at, Miss Evans? Get your robe – it's straight to the Head Teacher's office for you!"

The music suddenly went off, and Lily looked over to see Mary taking it away, probably so that Madam Hooch didn't get even more riled up. Mary then began scrambling around for Lily's cloak, but apparently it was nowhere in sight.

Lily was just contemplating how much trouble exactly she could get into for what she had just done, when she felt a warm, toned arm around her bare shoulders- Potter. Lily grimaced and felt the urge to squirm away from him, but the sincere look on his face prevented her from doing so. He gave her shoulder a subtle squeeze, all the while looking at the sports teacher in a friendly manner.

"Is there a problem, Madam Hooch?" He asked, flashing her his toothy, charming smile which most girls couldn't help but fall for.

"Yes, in fact there is. I cannot have Miss Evans here putting on that display. It's unacceptable."

"Oh, my apologies, Ma'am."

At this statement, both Lily and Madam Hooch looked at him questioningly.

"I don't understand, Potter?"

"You see, my uncle took me to see the English muggle football team play in the summer, and they had beautiful girls called 'Cheerleaders' doing routines, encouraging the men to play better, you know, similar to what Veela's do at Quidditch matches. I thought it was an excellent idea, and Lily here was willing to lend a hand, and as you saw, everyone started working much more efficiently. I apologise if you took offence, I just want to make sure that Gryffindor win the cup again this year, and so does Lily."

Lily looked at him, her pink lips transformed into a comical 'O' shape, eye brows raised. Madam Hooch shuffled about uncomfortably.

"I should have known it would be your doing. Detention, Potter. You must ask my permission of these things. There were second years about! Miss Evans, next time . . . wear more appropriate attire."

Lily squeaked out an agreement, standing there shocked as James checked his watch and told the rest of the team that they were dismissed, before turning to look her up and down. Lily watched, avoiding eye contact, as he shrugged out of his deep burgundy and gold Quidditch robe and draped it around her shoulders. It was only then that she realised she had been shivering.

"You shouldn't have taken the blame for me," Lily said, coming to her senses. However much she was thankful to be out of trouble, she hated being in peoples debt – especially Potter's.

"Forget about it, it was worth it," He winked. "Anyway, another detention isn't going to kill me, but it looked as though it might just finish you off. And we couldn't have that now, could we Lilypad?"

"Guess not." She replied shortly, ignoring the pet name. "Besides, you're the cause of my only other detentions."

"Oh, so it was me who hexed you, right?" he snorted.

"I said 'the cause', didn't I?"

"I'll give you that one." He asked, flashing her that smile again, as he lifted one of her numb arms into the arm hole. "Not that I'm complaining, but do you fancy telling me what all that little show was all about?"

"Not really, no," She replied.

"C'mon Evans, you owe me"

Lily scowled. "I was playing a game."

"Looks like a fun game..."

"It is." Lily bit her lip. "Usually."

"In return for my saving your arse right then, how about you let me play?"

"Not gonna happen Potter."

"Too scared that I'll beat you Evans?"

"Dream on." Lily jeered. "It's not that sort of game anyway."

"I'll win whatever game it is." Lily had to grin at his persistence. He really was stubborn, of course she knew this from experience; he hadn't been thawing over her for the past few years for anything less than his stupid stubbornness. "How about you let me prove that to you?"

"You want to play with us girls all on your own? Can you really bare to be apart from your precious Sirius for so long?"

"Don't be ridiculous- of course i can't." He deadpanned, making Lily laugh. "I'll be bringing the rest of the Marauders along with me! ... As long as that's okay with you?"

Lily felt fairly surprised that he had been polite enough to ask her permission, and she found herself agreeing to him.

"I guess that would be okay . . . I mean, Hestia would like that."

"Great, well as I said, we are just finishing up here, so we'll just nip back up to the changing rooms, have a quick shower, and be up with Sirius and Marlene in twenty minutes."

"You called?" Grinned Marlene, slinging an arm around each of their shoulders. James and Marlene's families were very close, and so the two of them had been bought up together. Naturally she felt very comfortable around him.

Lily felt Marlene's Quidditch bag bump into the back of her leg, and judging by the distinctive gleam coming from her forehead, Marlene hadn't showered yet either. As if she knew Lily's train of thoughts, Marlene continued. "I'll wash back at the dorm. I wanted to catch up with you, y'know, check and see if you'd survived Madam Hooch. Figured it would probably be best for me to break the news to the girls if you hadn't…"

"I'm very much alive." Lily replied drily.

"That's good, because I wanted you to let me know next time you plan on repeating, though, I might just join you. It looked fun."

"Let me know too," Grinned James. "I'd participate."

"So long as you won't fall off of your broom James," laughed Marlene freely. "I wasn't sure whether you had been confunded into thinking that Christmas had come early, or whether you'd just been stunned?"

"Oh, I was most definitely stunned," James replied, wriggling his eyebrows suggestively at Lily.

"So, are you wanting to meet in the common room?" asked Lily over her shoulder as she tried to ignore James' comment and reached for Marlene's hand. She turned to walk away, unable to get her mind around the whole fiasco.

"Sounds perfec…" replied James quietly, as he watched the rhythm of Lily's swaying hips as she walked off into the night.

o.O

Lily and Marlene walked in through the portrait hole, only to be met by four anxious faces. Hestia was drumming her fingers on the table in an impatient manner, Alice was gripping the hand of her long term boyfriend Frank Longbottom, taking comfort from him, and Mary was slumped in an armchair, feet tucked up, looking even more nervous than usual. Mary was the only one who noticed them at first, the other three were urgently muttering something about how much trouble Lily would be in.

Mary bolted upright as soon as Lily came into view, causing the other three to turn around. Lily smiled at them all to show that everything was okay, as Marlene dragged her over to their usual fireside perch.

"We're so sorry Lily," gushed Mary, as Hestia and Alice begun their own apologies. "We had no idea that Madam Hooch was overseeing practise!"

"You can do anything to us for payback!" but in Alice.

"We'd totally deserve it!"

"We wouldn't even complain!"

"..Well not anything… we have out limits…"

After another minute of this, Marlene grinned and turned to Lily. "Do you think it's time to put them out of their misery yet?"

"Nah, I could get used to this grovelling. It's fun" she replied.

The three grovelers paused.

"What?" asked Hestia, evidently confused.

"…She got off scott-free!" laughed Marlene.

"How in Merlin's name did you manage that?" Asked Frank, clearly astonished.

"Let's just say having Mister James Potter worship the ground you walk on comes in useful at times," replied Marlene, only to be met with a glare from Lily.

"Potter got you out of this?" asked Alice, not hiding her surprise.

"How did he do that?" Wondered Mary.

"What, and he didn't demand a romp in the broom closet for doing so?" cried Hestia, a little too loudly, attracting curious stares from the younger students.

"Shh!" reprimanded Lily, remembering her head girl status. "Not exactly, he just wants to play with us."

"And what did you say to that?" Alice asked.

"I said he could," Lily replied, upon seeing the smirks on all of her friends' faces, she carried on. "What else could I say? He'd just saved me from having my 'Head Girl' badge taken away from me!"

"Chill Lily," Sighed Marlene. "It'll be fun!"

"Oh yeah, fun for you! You like the Marauders."

"You would too, if you gave them a chance." Countered Hestia.

"They have never given me reason to give them a chance. All that James Potter - occasionally with the help of Sirius Black - has done to me for the past few years are things that they know will tick me off. They both have a huge ego, which is probably because they're both filthy rich and have most likely always had everything handed to them on a silver platter. So give me one reason that they deserve for me to give them a bloody chance?! They've blown it."

"Breathe, Lily." Said Mary calmly. "We're only saying how you could easily learn to like them. It's your choice on whether you do or don't, we're not making you."

"Good."

"So does Potter even know what we're playing?" Asked Hestia. "I mean he is pure-blood and all."

"When it comes to Lily, you could have been playing with your dollies and he'd be there," Grinned Frank.

Ignoring this comment Lily marched on. "I didn't mention it… he just said that he'd be there with his friends."

"Oh, so I guess Remus will be playing, right?" asked Mary, a little too nonchantly. She glanced at Hestia before adding. "And Sirius and Peter, too?"

"I guess…" replied Lily grinning fondly at her innocent friend. "I'm not going to back out of my promise to Potter, but mark my words- this will only result in trouble."

"So what?" smiled Marlene. "Getting in trouble is fun. Live a little, Lils."

"Anyway, by the sounds of it, you owe it to Potter." Continued Hestia, grinning. She knew Lily too well. She understood her weak points, and knew that she detested owing anybody anything. "Plus, playing dares with boys? Who knows where it will take us?"

"Hey!" protested Frank. "What am I?"

"You, my friend, are taken." Replied Alice, pressing a chaste kiss to his lips.

The girls barely had time to grumble at the thoroughly loved up couple to 'get a room', as they were distracted by raucous laughing coming through the portrait hole. Lily didn't need to look towards the noise to know who it was. Fighting the urge to roll her eyes she raised her head, to see the Marauders heading their way, all smiling- nothing new there.

o.O

"Ah. So that's why you're out of the changing rooms so quickly, I'd of thought you needed a nice, long, cold, shower after Lily's little… show, earlier on." Sirius Black said in reply to his best friend, as he flicked his long black tresses idly out of his face in a way that made girls crumple to their feet all around him. The four Marauders were traipsing back up to the Gryffindor common room after training, and James had just explained that Lily's prior actions were down to some game she and her friends had been playing, the very game that the four of them would soon be joining in with.

"Tell me how you managed to bribe Lily to let you spend time with her?"

"She invited me," grinned James.

"Likely story," Snickered Sirius.

"And by that you mean that you invited yourself." Stated Remus at the exact same time.

"It's the same thing!" protested James as Remus recited the Gryffindor common room password. James' expected answer made the other three boys burst out laughing as they had heard him say that phrase too many times. James himself had to chuckle at the sight of his best friends.

'Probably pulled another successful prank,' Lily thought sourly.

"Ever get that feeling where you're missing something?" Hestia mused.

"All the time," Frank replied, as his four dorm mates approached them.. "Fancy sharing the joke?"

"They all think that they're amusing." Sulked James, as he sunk down into the couch next to Marlene.

"Oh Prongsie, we are amusing and you know it." Sirius stated. He sat on the floor, beneath where Hestia was sitting. He lolled his head back and oh so casually flung his arm onto the sofa so that his fingers were trailing in a circular motion on the tanned skin of Hestia's exposed thigh. Her skirt had ridden up, much to Sirius' advantage, as a result of Hestia being sat down for so long. She shivered with pleasure, and let her own hands and delicately caress his gloriously long thick hair. Their exchange was practised and discreet, so that nobody other than the two knew what was happening, which simply encouraged the two teenagers.

"I think his head needs deflating somewhat," Continued James, knowingly using one of Lily's most famous lines, which made them all laugh.

A quick battle had gone on inside of Lily's head, where she was unable to tell whether he was making fun of her, but she soon realised that the joke was more pointing towards himself, and due to the twinkle in his hazel eyes, creased up from happiness. Lily joined in with the chuckles after only a matter of seconds. James noticed this and it delighted him to know that he could make her smile. He could never explain the effect she had on him by doing such minor things.

She was so beautiful, her deep red hair cascading down her slim shoulder blades, accentuating the heart shape of her head.

The rarity of her laughter certainly was a shame, James conceded. The amount she laughed had been decreasing notably in the past few weeks, whereas the bags under her eyes were forever increasing. James had an obvious theory for the reason this, but he knew better than to confront her about it, it was much too personal for someone like him to ask her, and there was also the fact that she didn't even particularly like conversing with him. But hey, it was an improvement from the previous year when she couldn't even stand looking at him.

"So I heard we were going to be playing a game?" Peter piped up after the laughter had died down.

"Well it's getting quite late-" Lily started.

"Peter, we were playing Truth or Dare." Hestia said, cutting Lily off, before she could get started.

"What's that?"

"It's pretty self-explanatory, to be honest," replied Lily.

"We take it in turns to choose either 'truth' or 'dare'," continued Mary. "If you choose truth, then the rest of the group ask you any question they like. If you choose dare, then the group decide on something which you must do."

"We've played this before!" exclaimed James.

"We have?" asked Peter, crinkling his forehead as he tried to remember.

Sirius grinned and nodded, the memory flooding back. "Well we never really gave it a name, and it didn't have the whole 'truth' element to it, but do you remember that summer when we all went to stay at the Potters' Mansion in France-"

"You have a Villa in France?" Hestia asked incredulously. James replied with a small shrug as if it was no big deal.

"That's nothing," replied Peter for James. "His family have a Villa on a beach in the Mediterranean, one next to some skiing resort in Switzerland-"

"Wormtail!" exclaimed James, throwing a cushion at his head so as to make him shut up. As proud as James was of his heritage, he didn't like flaunting his money. It was an embarrassing concept, and he didn't want people to think that he would have his life bought for him, his parents had already made it clear that although they would support him, they'd only put in as much effort as he would.

"And you have not lived until you've seen the view from the Potter mansion in Spain!" Added Marlene, ruffling James' hair, enjoying his discomfort.

"Guys," James stated in an exasperated tone.

"So are you gonna tell the girls about our game of dares with the French muggles, Sirius?" Interrupted Remus, changing the subject back to its original.

"I don't know, I enjoy annoying Jamesie boy," replied Sirius, earning himself a shoulder punch from his best mate. "We went to the beach that time and there was some French muggle girls who offered us a game. It was fun whilst it lasted-"

"- but we had to call it quits early because you ended up going into one of the girls houses and not coming back out." grinned Remus. "So I'm guessing that Lily chose Dare earlier on?"

Lily burrowed her face into a nearby cushion, hiding her blush. "You guys are never going to let me live that down, are you?" She groaned in a muffled voice, met only with chuckles. "Can we just restart the game already?"

"I'm in." decided James immediately, followed by the rest of the seventh year Gryffindor's.

* * *

_So, first chapter's up! Anything you liked/disliked about it? And if you have any ideas for truth or dares then feel free to let me know and i'll give credit to you :-) thanks for reading!_


	2. A proper Game

A Magical Game of Truth or Dare

Chapter two: a Proper Game

"Okay, who wants to go firs-"

"Wait, wait, wait!" Interrupted Sirius eagerly. "How about we lay out some ground rules?"

"Like what?" Yawned Alice.

"Let's make this into a proper game," He grinned, looking intently around at his peers' faces. "Y'know, consequences, officiating, and rules- things like that. Also, I don't think an hour for a game of this scale is long enough."

"What are you suggesting?" James asked, his interested perked.

"Okay, consequences…. If you refuse to do you dare, or won't answer your truth, then you will have a forfeit."

"What type of forfeit?" Mary asked warily.

"A dare with no reservations whatsoever - you simply have to do it."

"So technically, you'll get given a much worse dare?" James stated, hints of a smile creeping up his cheek bones.

"I think that's good enough to persuade any wusses." Replied Sirius, his hand creeping up Hestia's a little further, making it very difficult for her not to squirm.

"Right… and what do you mean by officiating?"

"Everyone who is playing will play." Remus said, answering for his friend, earning nods of agreement from everybody. "You can't drop out half way through, nor can anyone else join in."

"I think I know a charm that could work actually…" Lily mused.

"I was thinking of the exact same thing!" exclaimed Sirius excitedly.

"You can think?" snorted Alice, amused at the pout which appeared on Sirius' face.

"Shocking, isn't it?" Lily murmured. "And I doubt you were thinking along the lines of what I am."

Sirius opened his mouth to retort, but was interrupted by James. "I know where you're going with this," he grinned mischievously. "And as much as I'd love to try it out, I think it is a little OTT."

"But-"

"No." James said firmly, if a little sadly, to which Sirius let out an exasperated sigh.

"I haven't even said my idea!"

"I think it's better like that," responded James. "Wouldn't want to give Lily-pad a heart attack." Lily scowled. "You were going to suggest the Unbreakable Vow," continued James. It wasn't a question.

"Was not," lied Sirius, scowling and avoiding eye contact with his friends.

James smirked, and Lily raised her eyebrows.

"Well that is certainly not where I was going. One of us could die, Sirius! Or worse! Get expelled!"

Now it was the rest of the groups turn to raise their eyebrows.

"Okay, that came out wrong," admitted Lily diffidently. "But like I was saying it would be completely irresponsible of us-"

James rolled his eyes and zoned out – just as he so often did during her rants. He watched as the fire lit up in her almond-shaped eyes, making them shine a thousand shades of green. Her eyelashes fluttered making the light dance, setting off what could only be described as the effect of disco balls-

"Okay, Lily- we get it." Hestia's bored voice bought James back from his Utopia. "We'll think of something else. No big deal."

Lily slumped back in her chair. She had such a hot temper and she knew that full well. But really, those Marauders just asked for it. How could he be such an imbecile? One of these days Sirius Black would meet his end with this childish foolishness, and she for one was not going to sit around and watch that happen. She might as well at least _try _to get some sense through his thick skull.

"I think I know what Lily was going to say," Remus spoke up, knowing that it was unlikely that Lily was going to be the one to break the silence, now that it was turning slightly awkward. Remus was the only one out of the Marauders that Lily trusted and liked.

He had earned her trust by proving to her, during those long hours of doing their prefect rounds, that Remus Lupin wasn't just the 'Marauder master mind', but a genuinely nice and considerate guy. They had been good friends for the majority of Fifth and Sixth year, but their relationship hadn't been as easy as it used to be ever since that night- but Lily preferred not to think about it - especially in the presence of their friends. The two of them had both made some unspoken agreement so as not to repeat anything that had occurred to anybody. They both had their own reasons not to –Remus' was for James' sake, and Lily's was for Mary's. Lily shook her head as though trying to shake away the thought, and tilted herself towards Remus in a gesture to prove that she was listening, encouraging him to carry on.

"Here we go again," murmured Frank to Alice good naturedly.

"Are you thinking of the spell from the Introductory Book of Wizarding Careers that we all got given in Fifth year?" Remus asked, turning to face Lily.

"As if you two have that book memorised," Snorted Hestia.

"Yes, I was actually. Only… it could be pretty dangerous," Fretted Lily, completely ignoring Hestia's unuseful snide comment.

"I thrive off of danger." Added Sirius.

"Yeah, but only if performed incorrectly," Remus countered, choosing not to reply to Sirius.

"I guess we'll just have to make sure that we perform it correctly then," Grinned James, earning himself a chastised look and an eye roll from Lily. He noticed this, and hastened to continue. "Which should be perfectly easy, considering that we have the best student in the year with us."

"Oh Prongs," Sirius said, batting his long black eyelashes at James. "You're _too _kind."

"I'll be right back." Lily called over her shoulder, trying to brush off the compliment from James. However, the fact that the notorious James Potter had actually commended her for something which she was proud of, did make her feel quite… _flustered_? Or would special be a better word? It was nice, and unfamiliar, to be appreciated sincerely by somebody who meant it. But did he mean it? Lily could not make up her mind about who James Potter was.

But she was determined to find out.

Once again, for what must have been the billionth time that night, she felt herself fighting an oncoming blush - damn her ginger genes - as she continued her flight up the staircase leading to the Gryffindor girls dormitories.

Seeing as Lily was now in her Seventh year, her room was on the second to final floor now, only second to the Head's dormitories, and she was panting by the time she got to their bedchamber. She really needed to take up Quidditch or some other form of exercise. Lily reached under her bed and rummaged around for a few minutes, through the hordes of books which had accumulated there. She finally found what she was looking for, and shot right back down the stairs, flicking through the pages of the hard back book as she went.

"Here it is!" Lily exclaimed, making the rest of the group jump at her reappearance. "Right, do you guys remember a couple of years back, before we took our OWLs, when school gave us all those leaflets and books to help us choose a career? Well, being muggle born, I didn't really understand much about what there was for me once I left Hogwarts, or how to go about getting what I wanted. So unlike most of you, I actually read this-"

Sirius barked out a laugh, rolling his eyes.

"Don't mock me Black." Lily threatened. "And in it, near the back, is a chapter on employment, and there's a little section on a spell they used when dealing with contracts. It's basically 'a charm which binds participants to doing an activity for a specific amount of time."

"What's so dangerous about that?" asked James, confused.

"Well if we don't cast it perfectly, following all of the steps then we will be bound into the game for the rest of our lives."

There was a silence which followed Lily's words, only to be broken several seconds later by none other than Sirius Black.

"Better make sure we do it right then, eh?"

Lily rolled her eyes at his cockiness. "First of all we need parchment-"

"I have some right here-"

"No, not any old parchment, some from the tree of a magical plant."

"…That could be problematic," sighed Remus.

"I think I could get my hands on some," stated Sirius, a slight smile forming.

"How-?"

But Lily was interrupted by Sirius closing his eyes in concentration, raising his wand, swishing it around, before saying clearly "Accio McGonagall's parchment!" , and sure enough seconds later a whizzing sound was heard at first faintly, becoming louder, until some of the students in Gryffindor had to duck quickly so as to avoid colossal paper cuts. Sirius leant out and caught the paper, which was emitting a slight glow, smoothly, holding it up for all to see with an obvious smirk planted on his face.

"How did you know she had that?" Asked Alice in wonderment.

"Well you would too if you'd had to clean up her office for detention on your Friday night!"

"But-"

"You ask me no questions I will tell you no lies," he said, holding up his palm. "What next, Lily-bean?"

"Don't call me that," Lily muttered as she consulted her book once again, before requesting the parchment. She examined it to make sure that it was indeed magical, as if the silver gleam that it was emanating wasn't enough. Lily checked the common room, thankful to see that most of the students were either at supper or in their respective bedchambers. Once satisfied she lay it on the oaken coffee table to her left.

"We need to charm the parchment now. It says here that 'for every person who is involved in the treaty, they must each cast the spell, binding themselves. The caster recites the spell 'foedere omnes', and each person must trail their wand on the paper in a figure of eight motion, in turn.' Once we have all bound ourselves, the person who cast the spell first, being me, must finish the round by performing the 'finite incantatem' spell."

"Oh! I did that spell just over Christmas!" exclaimed Hestia. "I was made to do it at Gringott's when I got my trust fund, being of age and all. It's simple really; it's used all the time!"

"I remember my father performing it once, with one of his employees, when I was younger," said James, with a small, fond smile. "I remember being bloody terrified for him at the time because I thought they had just made the Unbreakable Vow."

This comment was met with laughter. In this brief pause, Lily gripped her wand in her right hand, and a focused look, that could not be described as anything other than sheer concentration overtook her facial features, as was common when she was performing difficult magic. Lily raised her wand, trailed it in a figure-of-eight motion on the parchment, muttering "foedere omnes".

Everyone was silent by this point, and Lily nodded to Frank, who was next to her, to motion that it was his turn to do the spell. He did so with a shaking hand, and then Alice performed it, and so on. Once Mary, who was on the right hand side of Lily, had completed the spell, Lily muttered the words 'Finite incantatem'.

The parchment sparkled brightly for several seconds, stunning them all by its beauty, until the gleam died down and there was a question in neat calligraphy at the top of the parchment.

Lily let out a breath of relief which she hadn't known that she was holding in and smiled brightly at the fact that it had worked. She had known they wouldn't get into serious trouble, as Dumbledore was usually available to lend a helping hand, and he could no doubt get them out of any mess, but she hadn't wanted to be cocky. On top of that she didn't really fancy going to the head master to let him know that his head boy and girl had got into a bit of a fix.

"What does it say?" Asked James from over Lily's shoulder, startling her at his proximity. She breathed in his foreign scent, unable to decipher it. She recognised the typical masculine scent mixed in with vanilla yet at the same there was something sort of warm and _homey_ to him aswell. Lily suddenly realised what she was doing and tried to snap out of it. She leaned forward in the pretence of deciphering the fancy writing, but in reality it was so as to distance herself from James, and let her hair form a curtain around her to hide her blush.

"'State how long this contract will last in the space given below.'" Lily read out loud. She looked up at the faces of her friends. "Well? How long do we want to play the game for?"

"All of tomorrow?" Peter suggested.

"But it's a Monday, so we won't really get the full benefit of the game," countered Remus.

"Why don't we start next weekend then?"

"Nah," whined Sirius. "That's too far away!"

"How about-" Grinned Remus. The smile was a mixture of excitement, guilt and apprehension. I mixture which the rest of the Marauders knew to be a good sign. "We have a long game. Say a week?"

"I thought that you were the one I'm supposed to like?" Lily groaned, placing her head in her hands.

Remus shrugged, still smiling, as he let James reply for him.

"Nah, there's a reason we keep him around; he's the mastermind of our group for a reason."

"But I thought he was supposed to be our secret weapon?" Quizzed Peter.

"Not so secret anymore," sighed Sirius.

"Good to know who your true friends are right?" Remus retaliated drily. "I think I might just take back those Christmas presents I gave to you all."

"You know that reason I was on about?" James hastily reiterated. "I was implying that you were the best friend a guy could have."

"Hey!" Exclaimed Sirius. "And here I was thinking I meant something to you, Prongs."

"Why ever would you think that?" Sassed James.

"Oh, I don't know, it's just that when you invite somebody to live at your house, they tend to hold a special place in your heart," Sirius replied neurotically feigning a wound in his heart.

"You two live together?" Hestia asked interestedly, clearly having heard nothing of the sort prior to this mention. Marlene and the Marauders all exchanged dark glances, before Sirius quickly changed the subject.

"I've been pondering over Moony's suggestion."

"Did you just say pondering?"

"Well I get mocked for saying thinking!"

"How about you just don't talk at all then?" Lily muttered derisively.

"As I was saying, I agree with Moony."

"I like where this is going," butted in Peter.

"I don't," stated Lily and Frank in unison.

"You do realise that we are going to be here all night if you guys don't let Black get another word out." Interrupted Hestia. "And I need to give my nails another coat. So if you could hurry up, that'd be fabulous."

"Hear hear!" Cried Sirius.

"What, do you have your nails to go and polish, Sirius?" Marlene replied, shooting him a wicked look, to which Hestia took it upon herself to playfully punch Marlene in the arm.

"Hear hear," he murmured, in agreement to Hestia's beatings.

"Okay, so for the third time. Isayweplaythegameforonemonth onthetrotnotstoppingatallsot wentyfourseven. Sound good?" Sirius asked, panting slightly. He looked around at the small gathering, only to find that everybody was looking at him completely blankly.

"Come again?" Frank asked, being the first to recover.

"I had to say it quickly, you see, or else I'd have been interrupted again."

"Yeah, you know, other than the fact that we didn't understand a word you said," James said sarcastically. "It would have been a good idea,"

"Except, we didn't understand a word you said and so it wasn't a good idea," Remus replied bluntly.

"I said: we could make it really exciting, and play for a whole month!"

His statement was met with nothing but silence.

"That's your idea of exciting?" Lily asked skeptically. "Funnily enough, that's my idea of hell.

"Sirius Black, are you crazy?" Hestia asked, agreeing with her best friend for once.

"Why yes, I rather believe that I am."

"One whole month of non-stop truth or dare?" Remus asked, blanching. One month. He was a werewolf. Lots of things could, and did, happen in one month. If he mentioned his furry problem to his friends now, or could somehow get them to understand what this month could entail, he would, but Remus didn't want them to have to quit their fun because of him – they already did so much for him as it was. It wouldn't be fair, and so he didn't say a word.

"It's a great idea!" cried Marlene, eyes bright. "There are so many of us playing that it's not as if we'd all get loads of turns, and heck, it's our final year here at Hogwarts! Let's live it!"

Lily had to admit, looking around at her friends' gleaming, or in some cases, worried faces, that it would be fun. She sighed, muttered an 'I am so going to regret this', picked up a rogue quill and inked back a response in a small, neat hand. 'One month. 26th of January – 26th of February.'

"It's the 25th today, so I'm going to make it so that our little 'contract' starts tomorrow, but technically that's midnight tonight." Lily explained.

"What's the next question?" Frank asked the room at open.

"'How often shall the activity take place?'" read James, sliding the parchment away from Lily.

"Are we supposed to know what that means?" Questioned Peter.

Mary picked up the book which had been discarded on the floor by the fireplace and looked at it.

"There are a few examples in here," She pointed out in her quiet tone. It was one that was not commanding in the slightest, but had a certain ring to it that made everyone stop and listen. It was either that or they didn't want to miss what she said because of her limited volume. "One says '9am-6pm Monday-Friday, except on public holidays'. Another says 'twice a day- once every twelve hours'."

"I vote once at least once an hour," piped up James.

"I most definitely disagree with that," replied Hestia. "This is going to be a twenty four – seven thing right? I need my beauty sleep."

"Honey, you need to hibernate," snickered Marlene, throwing a wink in the general direction of Hestia.

"Hour and a half?" tried Sirius.

"Let's make it three." Bargained Remus.

James whined. "Mooony-"

"-Maturity right there," Sniggered Lily.

"-Don't be such a spoilsport!"

"I'll make it at least once every two hours," decided Lily as she scribbled down the answer. No sooner had she finished writing had Peter started reading out the third and final order in a hesitant voice.

"'Write down the terms and conditions to the activity'."

"They really ought to be clearer with these orders," Alice ackowledged.

"I think they mean for us to say what it is we're signing up for, what we have to do, you know…" Replied Lily to her friend.

"And why could they not have just written that?" Alice grumbled.

Everyone grinned at Alice's answer as they thought about what terms and conditions should be included.

Everybody watched as Lily carefully wrote down the Forfeit rule.

"I think that I should write down how we play, too," Lily murmured, looking up.

"You do that then," Sirius replied lazily, propping his feet up on the table, making Lily's ink smudge and blot. She shot him an icy glare.

"How about something like, one person starts, and gets to pick another player of their choice. Once that person has completed their truth or dare, they choose somebody else, and so on. That's fair, right?" Remus interrupted, deciding to help Lily out.

The group muttered their consent.

"Write down how all truths must be answered honestly," James decided, as Lily wrote down the previous progression.

"Well obviously," drawled Marlene. "But how do we make sure of that?"

"It's obvious isn't it..?" Lily asked, drawing everybody's attention to the guilty smile fighting its way onto her face. The rest of the group looked at each other. Mary nodded her head and smiled as she realised what lily was getting at. Their friends looked between the two of them quizzically, acknowledging their guilt and bubbling excitement.

"You know, you guys could inform us…" Hestia mused sarcastically.

"I must be the worst head girl this school has ever seen," Lily muttered, her smile becoming more pronounced. "Oh, all right then! The NEWT potions class were all working on Veritaserum last week in class, and, well-"

The rest of the group's eyes lit up as they realised where this was going. They all knew full well what Veritaserum was. The Truth Serum.

"Why didn't I think of it?!" James asked himself as his face lit up.

"Probably because you spent the whole lesson trying to figure out how to get some down Snivellus throat without him realising." Replied Remus scathingly. "I was your partner, I ought to know."

"Ah yes. I remember now," James chuckled at the memory, but turned it into a cough as his eyes met with Lily's death glare. Sirius on the other hand was completely oblivious and begun interrogating James as to how it went.

"As I was saying," Lily continued, glaring pointedly at Sirius. "As a reward for being the only one to make a correct potion-"

"Queen Lily," muttered Hestia.

"I wasn't showing off," rambled a blushing Lily. She hated people who sought attention, and she certainly didn't feel the need to show off in order to bring it to herself. "Severus would probably have claimed that title had he not been distracted-"

"You're welcome," grinned James.

"Anyway," Lily marched on. "I have a cauldron-full of the potion in my dorm."

"How did you manage to blag that?" asked Peter astonished.

"I've just explained, have I not?"

"No, no, what I mean is that Slughorn would never have let any of us take a potion like that back with us!"

"It's called trust," Lily smirked.

"That is totally biased," Hestia muttered.

"Meh, Slughorn loves Lily, are you surprised?" Sirius replied. "He's probably trying to win her over so that he can get in her pants."

Ripples of laughter followed that statement whilst Lily hid her head in her hands and cringed.

"That is so revoltingly disgusting Black!" She groaned, visibly cringing.

"Just think, Old Sluggy, hot, sweaty, all there for your taking."

"Eurgh, I don't think that mental image will ever leave my brain!"

"Oh, for all you know Slughorn has that effect on people," Snickered Hestia.

"Was that really necessary?" Lily grumbled. "I swear I'll never be able to look the man in the eye again!"

"Just look him in the crotch, he'd be perfectly happy with that," Chuckled Marlene.

"Are we done here?" Lily asked pouting.

Mary nodded in answer down at the piece of paper. It was shimmering and with a flash of light it laminated itself, indicating that the contract was complete.

"Good, I'm off to take a shower and try to wash any disgusting lingering thoughts of Slughorn away. I'll see you all at midnight I guess."

"Come on Lily, is it really so bad about spending time with us?" Sirius asked.

"Do you even want me to answer that?" Lily arched an eyebrow.

"Remember what we said earlier?" Hestia asked, her gaze penetrating into Lily's. Lily knew what she meant. Hestia was referring to when the girls had said that Lily could learn to like the Marauders. But truth be told, Lily didn't think they deserved that much of her time, after all the terrorizing they had put her through in the past. "It's you Lily, who's keeping this stupid feud going. You are going to stay here and socialise."

Lily opened her mouth with an excuse at the ready.

"Don't play the homework card either!" cried Hestia, clamping a hand over Lily's mouth. "You spent most of Friday night doing that damned Transfiguration essay, and I know because you let me copy it yesterday, and you completed the potions homework and Muggle Studies assignment in about half an hour this morning after breakfast! Do not even go there Lily Evans. You are playing this game whether you like it or not."

"Why do you even do Muggle Studies, Lily?" Asked Peter. "You are muggle born after all." Remus nudged Peter, and frowned reprimandingly at him, yet didn't say anything, for he too was interested in the answer.

"I know I am, but I think it's so fascinating to see how wizards percept muggles!" Lily replied, getting defensive.

"Don't get her started," Groaned Marlene.

Mary tilted her head to the side as though she was withholding more questions that she wanted to ask; Remus nodded politely; Alice smiled as though to say 'trust Lily', Peter just nodded, Hestia continued to trail her fingers lightly across the top of Sirius neck, whereas Sirius barked out a laugh insensitively. "You waste time on a subject you know just as well as the teacher, if not better, merely because it's 'fascinating'? I do Muggle Studies simply to annoy my parents! But man do I regret it; the number of essays we get- it's bloody torture…"

"You wouldn't understand." Lily looked thoroughly put out and slightly embarrassed. This agitated James. She had all these walls which she built up around herself, and she very rarely let out information about herself. Now she finally had, and she'd been ridiculed. He hated that. Lily looked away into the embers of the fire, blushing, obviously thinking it a futile attempt to bother getting worked up about it. For once in her life, Lily Evans looked defeated.

"I understand," James volunteered, Lily's head snapping up in suspicion. "Well, I find muggles pretty fascinating too, and I have wondered before about how they'd react if they ever knew that we existed. I even read a muggle book about wizards once. It was awful though – I think it was meant for muggle children. But they were saying how witches had green skin and warts on their noses and brewed potions to make everybody ill-"

"So pretty accurate for the majority of the Witches at Hogwarts then, right?" Smirked Sirius.

"We do not look anything like that!" Exclaimed Hestia.

"Well- maybe Marlene…" Lily grinned turning to face James, who was sat next to her on the couch, and whispered a hardly audible, delicate 'thank you' to him.

He acknowledged the gesture with a small nod of the head, but his heart was spinning like cartwheels. He felt Lily sink back into the cushions, brushing against him as she went. James heard her little sigh of relief, presumably glad that the attention was off of her once more. James had to resist the strong urge to wrap his arm around her, as he made a promise to himself that he would come to her rescue more often, if that was the response he would get.

"I do not have warts on the end of my nose!" Marlene whined.

"Notice how that's the only argument she can come up with," Snickered James, who had known Marlene his whole life. With their mothers being best friends through work, and the fact that they lived down the street from each other sort of made it impossible not to have most of their childhood memories revolved around the other.

"I believe that is your fault, not mine." she grumbled, looking pointedly at James - but the ever-present glint in her eye proved that she wasn't being serious.

"What, the fact that you're completely handicapped at Potions is my fault?" James retorted.

"Oh yeah, like you're one to talk!" Grinned Lily, shoving James' shoulder playfully. After their little exchange, Lily was beginning to be herself around him a bit more. Perhaps she'd take Hestia's advice into consideration and give him a break after all.

"Made it into the NEWTs class, didn't I?"

"Yeah, and who did you bribe this time?" She retorted.

James frowned. He had become very good at reading Lily's emotions, and he did acknowledge the flash of jest in her eyes. He was glad that she was becoming comfortable enough around him to joke like that, but to him, it was unprovoked and a bit out of order. As much as James enjoyed his comfortable life, he detested it when others presumed his wealth got him wherever he wanted. That was one of the many problems he had with Snape. "I have morals."

Lily was about to make some smart ass remark along the lines of 'yeah and so does the giant squid' but she noticed the slight coolness in his voice and decided not to pursue the topic of conversation. After all, they were finally on some level of civility, and Lily didn't want to be the one to screw all of that up, so instead she did something that was rare to someone as hot-tempered as herself. She bit her tongue. Thankfully, Marlene filled in the silence before it could begin to get awkward.

"No, I actually meant how it was completely your fault that I have no argument over my skin never being green," She stated, trying and failing to look stern at some old memory.

"That happened about a decade ago," James replied, fighting back a smile at the memory. "You'll never forgive me for that, will you? I was what, six, seven?"

"It scarred me for life," Marlene scowled. "My skin wouldn't turn back to normal for over a month!

"Let it go, Lenny." James replied, using his childhood nickname for the girl.

"Never!" She declared as she stood up. "Now, if you guys' don't mind, I'm going for a shower, whilst I have time, before this game kicks off."

They rest of them watched, amused, as she flounced out of the heads common room.

Alice shifted in her seat to look at James "Now, this is a story that I have to hear…"

o.0

"What have we gotten ourselves into?" Mary asked to the room at random, stretching out on her bed and yawning. It was quarter to twelve and they had arranged to meet the boys in the Head Common room at midnight, but had deciding on getting a couple of hours kip in beforehand.

Mary sat on her bed; arms crossed, and watched her friends for a moment. Hestia was unravelling her curlers, Alice was wrapping up her dressing gown, Lily was splashing water on her face in their en suite bathroom, and Marlene was predictably still sleeping.

"I think I'm going to be asking myself that question about five hundred times a day for the next month," came Lily's muffled reply from the bathroom.

"Do you not think that we'll get a bit bored of it after the first few days?" Mary wondered.

"Nothing's ever boring with the Marauders," Hestia replied.

"Not for you anyway, I'm pretty sure that you could always find things to do with them," Alice replied, sneakily winking suggestively at Hestia, who didn't appear to have heard what she said.

"And Mary, although I'm not much looking forward to it, I don't recall it ever being boring to a bunch of naughty nine year olds," Lily replied, leaning against the doorframe, rubbing her sleepy eyes in an attempt to stay awake.

"And when were you ever considered anything close to naughty?" Hestia snickered.

"I would explain but there's no point in me wasting my breath- you wouldn't understand anyway."

"And why is that?" Hestia asked raising an eyebrow.

Lily fought back a smirk as she had anticipated Hestia's answer correctly. "Because there's other ways to be naughty than in the bedroom."

Alice and Mary burst into laughter at Lily's quick retort, whilst Hestia lunged at Lily and tackled her over before sitting on her. Hestia made herself comfortable on Lily's back, and after much wriggling around she continued to fluff up her blonde locks, extracting curlers from their hidden depths.

"Why must you guys be so loud in the morning?" Marlene groaned, turning over and pulling her pillow over her head.

"Rise and shine, princess." Hestia sung. "Besides, it's not morning."

"What? Why on earth are you awake then?" Marlene cried out at having her pillow ripped away from her by Alice.

"Do you not remember our little… contract we made earlier on?"

It appeared that Marlene remembered as a look of dawning crossed her face. "That's why you're so excited then. Any excuse to snog Black, eh?"

"Jealous?" Hestia teased.

"Eugh. Not at all, I don't think Black even realises I'm a girl. I'm just his fellow beater, and that is exactly how I see him also."

"Well, you wouldn't be saying that had you tasted his lips."

"Again, something I do not intend on doing."

"Can't we just go back to sleep?" Mary grumbled.

"I second that," yawned Alice.

"Yeah, how about we just wait until the morning," Marlene suggested.

"Are you guys getting cold feet on me?"

"Contract- midnight - can't back out - bad things happen-" Lily replied in a breathy voice, gasping for air.

"You don't get to contribute to this conversation, Lily." Hestia stated, her eyes giving away the jesting nature of her comment.

"This may seem like an obvious question, but why are you sat on Lily?" Marlene asked, not looking confused at all, merely curious as to what she had missed.

"This girl needs to know her place!" Hestia simply answered.

"Oh, that clears it all up." Marlene replied sardonically.

"She insinuated that I am a… a slut or something. Which, I'll have you know, I am most certainly not." Hestia complained, not that she really cared that much. Hestia knew who she was and she would never let anybody change her. However much she covered it up though, it did annoy her a bit that her best friend, who knew her better than anybody might think of her as a whore.

"But- isn't a slut somebody who sleeps around?" Alice asked in a careful tone of voice which made it clear she wasn't aiming that comment at Hestia, just asking in general.

"Yes, and although I may have had my fair share of fun in the bedroom-"

Marlene snorted.

"Okay… maybe a bit more than my fair share-" The girls all burst into laughter at Hestia's sheepish voice. "But I for one wouldn't sleep with anything with a pulse! I have standards!"

"Would you – like a – medal?" Lily wheezed in short breaths. Yelping as Hestia sat down on her harder.

"My point is that I only have sex with people that I really like. Is there anything wrong with that?" Hestia demanded.

"So you've really liked about ten guys since the start of summer term?" Grinned Mary.

"No, only about five."

"Oh, only," exaggerated Alice. "I think the bigger question here is how do you 'really like' Black? Even after the torture he's put us through?"

Lily moaned as Hestia shifted her body weight in discomfort at the topic. "Hestia Jones, you better get off of me this instant or else I'll… I'll…"

"Or else you'll what?" taunted Hestia.

"Or else I'll give you detention!"

"Low blow," chuckled Marlene.

"I hate it when you abuse that Head Girl badge," grumbled Hestia as she slid off of Lily's back.

"Oh, like I'm doing tonight by letting you all come over to my Head Girl's common room to play a game?"

"Did I mention how much I love it when you abuse that Head Girl badge?" Hestia tried, as the girls sneaked out of their dormitory, on their way to meet the boys and officially get this game started.

* * *

_I apologise for the long wait, especially since it is only the second chapter. I was in a (minor) car crash, in the end I was fine, but I can't say the same for my macbook, and boom, there went all of my planning and the next five chapters. But I'm back on track now and the Game will start next chapter. I usually update on a weekly basis, but these chapters are turning out to be much longer than usual. I'm know and am sorry that there didn't seem to be much action going on in this chapter, but I considered it to be quite necessary in terms of getting the game going and getting some important information across._

_Also, my cousin is American and also a huge potterhead. She came over to England for the Olympics and also read this whilst she was here, helping me hugely get back on track, so thank you Sophia! One thing she did say was that my writing was so incredibly British (not sure if I agree) so if you see anything that doesn't really make much sense, or you would say it differently, let me know in a review and I'll see if I can prevent it in the future. Also, it's quite interesting to see :p_

_I will be refraining from taking my laptop anywhere in the car and therefore there should be another chapter up by the end of the week ;-) I don't want to get ahead of myself and post them too close to each other, but sometimes reviews encourage me to do so :-)_

_So until then, here's a question to think about and let me know in a review! Thanks for reading!_

What do you think transpired between Lily and Remus?

_also, i was wondering if anybody was interested in being a beta/editor for this fanfic? Perhaps give me some critique, advice and opinions, help me stay motivated and correct any errors? Message me if you are :-)_


	3. An Easy Mistake

Disclaimer: _I do not own the Harry Potter series. Unfortunately._**  
**

__Previously:

_Intro: All of the Seventh Year Gryffindors are playing a game of truth or dare. They are bound to a magical contract which states how they must play continuously for one month. For the girls there's Lovely Lily Evans, Hottie Hestia Jones, Mad Marlene McKinnon, Mousy Mary MacDonald and Awkward Alice Prewett. On the boys side meet Puzzling Peter Pettigrew, Responsible Remus Lupin, Jovial James Potter and Scheming Sirius Black._

_Relationships: Alice and Frank have been best friends for their whole life and as of the past two-and-a-half years she has been his girlfriend. Considers each of her dormmates to be her best friends. Hestia and Sirius are currently in a purely physical relationship, no-strings-attached fling. Mary also has a huge crush on Remus to which she won't she won't admit to. James fancies Lily and everybody knows about it, however Lily underestimates his feelings for her, passing them off as him attention-seeking._

_Necessary plots: Lily has a dark secret to which she has never told anybody: her parents are dead. She and Remus also have an unspoken agreement never to mention something that mysteriously happened a while ago during their rounds. Mary and Sirius also have hinted at having a troubled past, but haven't said anything much about it yet. _

**A Magical Game of Truth or Dare**

**Chapter Three: an Easy Mistake**

The girls crept up the wooden floorboards of the hidden staircase, which led to the ninth and final floor of Gryffindor tower. The girls hissed to each other every so often, pointing out a trick step, or one that would make a particularly loud creak. Every time which a step would groan in the obnoxious way (which tends to happen after having been worn down over the past millennia) the girls would pause where they were, listening out in case somebody had heard them. It wasn't that what they were doing wasn't technically allowed, it's just that the girls didn't want any questions to be asked about their suspicious behaviour; the five of them making their way to a hidden Common Room in the middle of the night. The five of them came to an abrupt stop as they crowded on the final few steps, and Marlene had to throw her arm out to prevent Alice from toppling back down the stairs. In front of them, there was no hallway or landing, no other place to go, except directly through a portrait of a pretty, familiar looking woman named Violet.

"You do look lovely this evening, Miss Violet." Lily said in a voice similar in tone to one of which you would use to talk to a three year old. Violet smiled back in response, and tossed her flowing blonde hair expertly over one shoulder as if to say: Well of course I do!

The first time this little exchange had happened; Lily's friends had all worn expressions of obvious bafflement, probing an amused Lily to explain that the secret to getting access to the Head Common Room was complimenting the painting. It had struck all of the girls as rather odd, and Marlene had found it most opportune to voice the opinions of the group, with 'what a load of bullocks.'

Lily had laughed along with the rest, for she had thoroughly agreed and admitted to feeling foolish whenever she entered through the portrait. This time round, instead of cussing Hestia smirked and Marlene snickered and proceeded to mimic Lily kissing Violet's ass. You'd have thought that these jokes had gotten old for the girls by know, as they had for the Marauders, but it hadn't really been all that long ago that Lily had taken her friends up the secret staircase, where Mary, Marlene, Hestia and Alice all ventured into the Head Pupil's dormitory for the first time.

Lily had been determined to stick to the ground rules of which their head of house, Professor McGonagall, had strictly set out for she and James: 'this room was a luxury and the duo were not to abuse it. It was for the pair of them to use for academic purposes. Many years ago it had been deemed necessary, as the pair of them would be working together closely and they could work in private. In more modern times, the old tradition still stood, as was common with many of the workings of the school. With extra responsibility came extra rewards, and this room was proof of that.' Lily remembered McGonagall turning to face James directing, 'However, rewards can easily be taken away; should it be that they are not deserved - as could responsibilities.

Since then, Lily had stumbled into one too many a drunken Marauder sleepover and finally decided not to be such a 'prude', as Sirius so kindly put it, and introduce her friends to the room on during the Christmas holiday when the teachers were much less strict on rules. They had spent three blissful weeks embracing peace and tranquillity that came with having your own dorm and common room. They had thankfully had the room all to themselves, as the Marauders had all left to spend Christmas with James' family. However once the term had started back up, Lily had been a bit more reluctant to have any sleepovers and such, and however much the rest of the girls preferred to abuse the freedom of Lily's (almost) personal space, they didn't fancy giving their Head Girl a seizure and tended to hang out in their cosy shared dormitory instead.

However much it may seem, Lily Evans wasn't just a goodie-two-shoes teacher's pet, nor was she a _complete_ stickler for rules. During her time at Hogwarts, Lily had 'bent' many of them before herself. She had proven that just a few hours ago out on the Quidditch pitch, but Lily always seemed to get away with it, either with her girlish innocence or her ability to think up believable excuses. But the thing which made Lily seem like such a bore was that there were several things that Lily simply did not agree with. This was where Lily's main traits came into action. Her kindness, stubbornness and loyalty always shone through.

You see, Lily had never really gotten over the fact that her own sister had turned so… mean to her. And so Lily tried to be really nice to everyone, except those who annoyed her; like James. Around him,

Lily Evans was a sweet, kind and ordinary girl, who happened to live with her Great-Grandfather, until she got her letter from Hogwarts. Regardless of the fact that her papa was increasingly hare-brained and erratic with age, she had long ago shown him of her newly found powers. He was supportive and happy for her at the arrival of the owl which bore her invitation to Hogwarts, but her sister felt jealous and made the remainder of her time at home making her feel miserable and lonely. You see, Lily had never really gotten over the fact that her own sister had turned so… mean to her. And so Lily tried to be really nice to everyone, except those who annoyed her; like James.

Lily had always been upset by how her sister reacted and because of that it made her feel; she had promised herself that she would always try to be kind and caring to everyone she met, hoping they never felt the same way she did. She was a remarkably intelligent girl who's very responsible and hardworking. Her assignments were always finished on time and she liked to be prepared for lessons, which is why you would often be able to find her in the library.

Having said all that, Lily's not afraid of a party and enjoys letting her hair down everyone once in a while to have fun. Lily tells everything to her friends and trusts their opinion on all matters of any importance. No matter how sweet people think Lily is, she has a feisty side of her that comes out when needed and if someone hurts anyone close to her. Which is where her aversion to James Potter had begun.

Lily's loyalty and dedication to the honour of her Head Girl position were also a major part of why she tried to follow the rules. In this day and age Lily knew how unlikely it would be for her to be able to get a job in the Wizarding world, what with all the fear and rife so prominent. Lily figured that her job as Head Girl of Hogwarts may get people to see that it was she, who was chosen by the greatest wizard of their time to have that position. Also, ever since Lily's first year, when she had looked up at the then-Head Students with such respect and admiration, that she decided what her aim for a successful career at Hogwarts would be. And just look where she was now. Top of her class in most subjects, Head Girl too. She'd worked for it and it had pay off, and Lily wasn't prepared to do anything to mess up this opportunity.

Next came her unwavering loyalty for her friends and her sense of what was the right thing. She would stand up for Frankie-first-year if it was the right thing to do. She couldn't sleep at night if she had taken the easy but wrong way out of something, especially if it meant that somebody else would be at a disadvantage. Lily would not tolerate bullying of any kind, even if that usually made her a target for it herself. She couldn't stand by and watch somebody be taken advantage of, and this is where she was glad that she, as first a prefect then a Head Girl, got to instigate the rules, and she took advantage of this. Her very first meeting leading the Prefects had been how they were going to clamp down on any bullying and, depending on how severe and how frequent, a rough twenty point house deduction and two nights of detention was deemed appropriate for the crackdown. Although it hadn't gained her any popularity points when the house points suddenly started tumbling down, Lily was proud of it. Not that she'd ever tell anybody, but she felt like she'd done her parents proud.

Lily remembered her father, Robin, favourite quote whenever Lily, Petunia or Rowan, her late younger brother, would ever ask for advice: 'The best thing to do is always the right thing' was what he'd say. Lily's mother, Daisy, had always said that Lily took some of her main traits from her father: her stubbornness, her fierce loyalty and her capacity to love. Lily felt sad when she noted that it had been one of these that Lily had tried to diminish. Her capacity to love. After all but one of the people of whom Lily loved the most had been ripped away from her, and then the one remaining had shut her out and left her all alone in her greatest time of grief and need, Lily had figured it was so much easier if she just didn't throw her love around as much. That way, she would be less likely to feel the fresh sting of the wound that undoubtedly comes with love. Lily didn't see how love could last forever, eventually it would fade or be stolen from you, and all you would have in remains would be agony. Pure, simple agony. Lily didn't think she'd make it if she ever felt that burn again.

Lily was bought back to the present only as Violet swung open on her eon-old hinges to reveal an expansive parlour that was about half the size of the Gryffindor Common Room. However, apart from the colour scheme, the Head Common room was very different indeed. It was rectangular, and each wall of the room homed different purposes.

On the wall of which they had just entered though also situated a small yet grand fireplace and mantelpiece, with a solid Gold bordered mirror just above it. Around the fire were various Scarlet and Gold armchairs and settees, and for this reason, it was the quarter of the room which looked most similar to your average common room. There was also a barely noticeable door in the corner which led down to the Seventh Year dormitories.

It wasn't until you laid eyes on the next wall; the one on the right, which told you it was more than a common room, for there was a kitchenette, full of cauldrons and the like for cooking. The little kitchen was complete with a breakfast bar, which sectioned it off. Along this wall was also a glass door in the corner, which led out to a terrace, which wrapped around the entire parlour, with little entrances jutting off into James' and Lily's rooms, connecting them all. Just another perk of having the penthouse.

The wall parallel to this, on your left as you walked in, was your typical small scale library, which was stacked with hordes of a rare collection of leather-bound books; the shelves all clinging to the wall in a fashion which seemed like they were going to snap at any given moment. Underneath the books lay a long desk, complete with draws of extra parchment. The desk had big fat books and many a quill scattered across it, making it look more like a study – clearly the deeds of the female inhabitant to the room.

Lily thought back to the time that she and James had first been introduced to their Common Room. She remembered feeling Potters' careful watch on her as she first laid eyes on the library. She recalled her growing excitement and somehow, probably by the look on his face, she just knew that James could sense it in her too. As Lily's eyes had pooled in thrill with an itching desire, Potter had burst out laughing - to which Professor McGonagall had been unable to explain and left shortly after. This made Lily chuckle too, at her hasty uncomfortable exit. It was these fond moments during which Lily started to think that maybe, just maybe, James Potter was going to turn out alright after all.

In each corner of the farthest wall was a door. The door on the left led to James' room, the one on the right, to Lily's. There was also one in the middle, which led to their shared bathroom, interconnecting their bedchambers also.

The girls entered the room just as the boys all poured out of James' dorm, all talking boisterously. As usual. They greeted one another before taking their seats in the precarious chairs dotted around the embering fire place. Before they had a chance to say anything further, the grandfather clock began to chime. Each teenager counted as the twelve loud clear gongs rang out, waiting expectantly in baited silence.

"So that was it? The contract has started?" Marlene asked, about thirty seconds after the final ring. "Because I was expecting to feel a bit different."

Everyone laughed and nodded their heads in agreement.

"So how are we gonna do this? Oldest starts?" Sirius asked.

"No!" exclaimed Hestia, the eldest, as she wracked her mind, trying to form some valid excuse. "That's unoriginal. Always done."

"How about we go alphabetically then," Sirius replied, looking slyly at Hestia. "Oh, what a shame it's still you - H."

"Wouldn't that be Alice?" Remus their interrupted the pairs' flirtatious banter.

"Oh, and Black, alphabetically is usually done on a surname basis," smirked Lily. "Meaning that it's you."

"Fuck logic," Sirius muttered, brushing his hair out of his face.

"Bit slow at this time of night, eh?" James grinned.

"That's not what I'm usually told," Sirius retorted, wriggling his eyebrows. "I pick Mary."

Mary's eyes widened in a way that could almost be classed as comical.

"Scared?" snickered Marlene.

"No," Mary shook her head vehemently. She wasn't jumping for joy either - being on the target end of Sirius Black was not a good thing. Especially when he didn't seem to be in a good mood. But she wasn't scared, exactly. Mary had been through a lot of things in her life, and she had no reason to be scared of this. She tried to sink into the background usually as much as possible so that she didn't make people curious about her. If they weren't curious then they wouldn't ask questions. Because with questions came answers, either well thought out lies or painful, pitiful memories. Mary didn't know which she hated the most. She turned to face Sirius "But why me?"

"It's always the quiet ones," Sirius replied mysteriously. "Truth or dare?"

"Truth, I guess."

"Aw, don't be boring!" Sirius whinged. "I had a really good dare for you as well!"

"Well, I suppose that's what you get for choosing the 'quiet' one," Mary smiled back.

"I think we're going to be learning each other's true colours this month." Sirius said, sounding miffed. "Okay, lily-bean, where's the Veritaserum?"

Lily stood up automatically as though she had been thinking along the same lines. "Why is it that the only damned cups I can find in here are shot glasses?" She asked, sparing to second to look pointedly at James before turning back to continue with her rummaging through the cupboards in search of an appropriate vial.

He shrugged sheepishly and pointed to Sirius. "It was his idea to transfigure them,"

"If I remember correctly, you didn't exactly object!"

Lily sighed at the duo, thinking about what an obvious lost cause they were. She passed by them as she went into her cosy spacious room, over to her cauldron in the corner, and filled up a shot glass. It was the only thing she could find, and not that she'd ever admit it to Potter, but it was a pretty convenient size for what they were using it for anyway.

Lily went back to her friends and smiled apologetically at Mary as she passed the shot glass over towards her. "Only use a couple of drops, it'll be enough."

"Why don't we all just drink like a cup a day of it to last us?" Hestia asked, holding back a yawn; she thought yawns were unattractive, you see.

"Well you can, if you want, and then you can let us know how it went spewing your secrets out to everybody all day." James countered.

"Plus, if a Professor happens to ask us what we're up to, we'd be forced to tell them the truth," Remus continued.

"Okay, okay I get it!" Hestia pouted.

They all turned and watched as Mary hesitated before dipping her tongue in the glass and licking up a couple of droplets like a baby kitten. She then turned to face Sirius expectantly.

"Mary, Mary, Mary. Hm."

"You could hurry up, you know," Mary scowled after about a minute of this suspension, looking down as she tried to repel all of the attention.

"What is your biggest regret?" Sirius asked.

"Way to start off deep," Marlene laughed, but was hushed as everyone waited for Mary's answer.

Thinking about it, Lily, or any of them for that matter, didn't really know much about Mary's life outside of school, for she had grown to be very good at changing the subject inconspicuously and reflecting questions back on her friends. But what surprised Lily the most was that Mary didn't even need to consider her answer. Must have been the Truth Serum; making Mary say what she knew, however deep down, was correct even before she'd come to terms with the fact herself.

"Not speaking to my mother whilst I had the chance," Mary said quietly, looking down in embarrassment. She didn't want to look up to see the astonished looks on her friends' faces. That certainly wouldn't have been what they were expecting. They probably thought it was something like 'not revising harder for my Herbology OWL.' Here was something she had purposely hidden to her friends for years, and now here she was, blurting it out. "Letting things spiral out of control, to the point of no return."

"Care to expand on your answer?" Asked Peter unsympathetically.

"Not really, no." she replied abruptly. "One question, right?"

"I'm sorry, Mary" replied Sirius, looking sincere and slightly ashamed of himself. "If I'd have known that would be your answer, I never would have asked that question."

"She's not dead." Mary said, wanting to clear that up, but still gazing at her feet.

Lily felt herself sucking in a sharp breath of air- she wished dearly that she could say the same for her parents. However, something pretty harsh must have happened to Mary in the past, something relatively similar to what Lily went through herself. Usually Lily would have made it her business to ask Mary about it later, but she knew from personal experience that Mary wouldn't want her to do anything of the sort. As nobody else really knew what more to say, Remus shuffled over on the couch and wrapped a kind arm around Mary, making her flush even more. Lily was glad he had done so; to know she had someone there was all that Mary would need right now.

"So I pick someone now, right?" Mary asked a little too brightly. She seemed to come slightly more alive at Remus' touch, more aware of herself. She looked around at each one of her friends, wondering who to pick and at the same time, trying to form a half decent dare in her mind. Mary could think of plenty of questions to ask each and every one of them, all of which she hoped weren't too intrusive. Naturally, Mary knew all of the girls very well, and decided it would be more interesting to ask one of the guys.

Mary couldn't bring herself to choose Remus, for reasons that she didn't particularly want to admit. Mary wasn't a flirty girl at all, and she thought she might embarrass herself or Remus if she tried to delve into his life, or it would perhaps make him resentful towards her. Best leave his go for someone else. Peter, well, Mary couldn't really bring herself to be overly curious about what was there to know about him. There was James and Sirius, but truth be told, Mary felt a bit intimidated by the two of them and decided that she couldn't possibly think up a dare or question that they would be put out by.

"Frank, truth or dare?" Mary asked, deciding that for now, he was her safest option.

"I think I'm gonna go with truth, just for this one," Frank replied, sitting up on the couch at the call of his name.

Mary thought for a bit as Frank sipped some of the Truth Serum. Plenty of revealing questions sprung to mind, and although she had spent quite a lot of time with Frank and knew him quite well (many thanks to Alice), Mary couldn't bring herself to ask him anything too harsh. So she opted for a question she'd always been curious about, just never nosy enough to bring up.

"Frank? Well, you know how Remus, Peter, James and Sirius-"

"How come I'm last?" demanded Sirius.

"-are all a group of four? You're the only other guy in our year in Gryffindor, and you're in their dorm. How come you aren't in the Marauder's, or aren't particularly close to them?"

There was a slight silence after that as Frank wondered how to answer that question, considering all of the aforementioned boys were in the room. Everyone else was quite surprised by the question too.

"I thought this was supposed to be a fun game," Marlene grumbled. "Why so serious?"

"Oh, sorry if it was a bit forward," Mary gushed. "Or too personal, I-"

"No, don't worry about it." Frank replied. "Well, I guess we all sort of went our own way in first year. Those lot were all fast friends by the end of the first night, whereas Alice and I, who had been best friends since we were born, stayed in the Common Room until all hours of the night, talking about the day and what our expectations were, you know, things like that, as we had done our whole lives. I guess it just sort of carried on like that, really."

There was a bit of a silence after that as everyone processed this. Nobody had ever really questioned the Marauder-Frank relationship. Leave it to insightful little Mary to think this one up.

"I'm sorry mate," It was James who broke the silence. "We didn't realise you felt like that, if we'd have known that you felt left out…"

"Oh, no no, I never felt left out," Chuckled Frank in reply. "I didn't mean it to come across like that. We've always been mates, haven't we, the five of us? It's just I had my own best friend, and you lot had yours. There isn't any big dramatic fall out or anything, it's just that I spent all my time with Alice, and I love doing so. She's always been enough for me."

Alice's grip tightened on Frank's arm as she felt her heart swell at his words. She leant forward to whisper something into his ear, when he turned and caught her soft lips on his, oblivious to their friends who were either cooing or groaning.

Alice pulled away, pressing her forehead against Frank's as she muttered a quick, breathless: "I love you."

Frank pecked her pink lips once more in reply.

"Okay, okay guys! PDA!" Hestia cried, throwing a badly aimed pillow at the couple.

"Like you can talk," Laughed Alice. "The things you and Sirius do when you think the rest of us aren't looking!"

"You think that we don't notice it," Scoffed Marlene. "But really we do, yet instead we choose to ignore it rather than bring it up and be further scarred for life."

"You say it like we should be ashamed," Sirius laughed, turning the attention away from Hestia so that she could compose herself. He knew that even she would be embarrassed by this, and he didn't want it to change anything between them. He was perfectly happy being at whatever unidentified relationship status they were currently at. She made him forget about his troublesome past whenever she was with him. She was a distraction, a very sexy one at that, and that was all he asked for. "Besides, isn't it your turn Frank?"

"Yeah," he replied. Personally Frank hadn't noticed anything suspicious between Sirius and Hestia, and he would have known nothing of the pairs relationship had he not been the person of whom Alice let off all of her steam to. "I pick Ali-"

"A word of warning, judging by your girlfriend's expression, Frankie boy," stated Sirius. "It looks like if you pick her, then you won't get laid for the next month."

"She doesn't scare me," laughed Frank.

Alice raised her eyebrows. She replied, a fake sweet smile on her face. "Make that the next millennia."

"James, truth or dare?" Frank retracted far too quickly, causing everyone to laugh.

"You really needed to ask?" James asked arrogantly. "Dare of course!"

"Just checking," frank addressed the group. "Can I dare him to do something out of this room?"

"Of course," replied Sirius. "That's the best part of the game."

"You'll probably get caught by Mrs Norris though," Remus snickered.

"Nothing new there," continued Peter, smiling at what must have been a collection of relevant memories.

"That's it!" Frank's eyes lit up in a way they seldom did. He had been given an idea. "James- I dare you to kidnap the cat."

A toothy grin worked its way onto James' structured face. "Done!" He immediately said, not seeming in the slightest bit reluctant to go forth with his dare.

"James Potter, are you crazy?" Hestia asked casually.

"Are you kidding Hest?" Laughed Sirius. "That kid has been dying to maim that cat since the first time he got us caught; seven years ago."

"It's most definitely his dream come true," finished Remus.

"We even hear him talking about it in his sleep sometimes," Sirius joked, before turning his voice into a breathy distressed whisper. "Must - steal – Filch's – cat-"

"That's a lie." James said frowning. "I do not sleep talk!"

"Okay, that one was a lie-" Sirius admitted.

"But you do sleep talk," Peter interrupted.

"Do not!" James argued feebly, for he didn't really have any clue on what he did whilst he was asleep. Frank grinned. Everyone chuckled at the immature banter.

"You do though," Frank countered. "Even I've noticed that."

"Me too," added Marlene.

"See mate," Sirius laughed. "But usually you're saying something along the lines of: 'Must – shag – Evans.'"

Everyone laughed except Lily and James, the former frowning, as she hated feeling like she was the subject of ridicule. The latter was objecting and denying, shrugging helplessly at Lily. Even if it was true, and it was possible, James didn't want her to think of him as a_ total_ pervert.

Remus took the diverted attention as an opportunity to whisper to James in a low voice.

"Prongs? You planning on taking the map? Because I'm pretty sure we left it in the Shrieking Shack last time."

"Guess not then," James replied, not taking his eyes off of Lily. "I have a better idea anyway." And with that, James made his way over to the food cupboard in the Kitchenette. He pulled out the strongest smelling can he could find of merlin-knows-what, collected his wand from where it must have fallen from his back pocket on the couch, and without another glance back, he strode confidently out of the door.

"Our contract says that you have up to two hours!" Remus called after him. "But you'd better not take that long otherwise we'll all fall asleep."

The last thing James heard was Sirius' monotone voice making bets, "Ten sickles say the cat finds him before he finds it?"

o.O

James crept around each corner, thankful that before the game started he had had enough sense to stuff his Cloak of Invisibility into the back pocket of his robes. For the tactic James was going for, he would certainly need it, in case anything over than Mrs Norris was to come along. He threw it over himself and prowled down the corridor. James cracked open the tin of vulgar looking meat coated in garlic, and let its strong stench waft about. Perfect for attracting a cat. He made his footsteps loud and heavy as he passed the faculty dormitories. He knew from experience that most of the Professors wouldn't exit at the sound of footsteps. Occasionally one would, hoping to collar another teacher with a question, and they would stick their heads out perhaps, but upon seeing nobody about, they would soon retreat. Besides, on a Sunday night prefect rounds usually went on until one am (he and Lily, as head students, had delegated that nights roles to prefects who had free periods the next morning so they could catch up on sleep.) and it wasn't until after that when Mrs Norris and Filch would go on the prowl, and so the bloody cat would undoubtedly be somewhere around.

James sat himself down in a corner, leaning against a cold, damn stone wall near Filch's own living space. James began tapping his foot rhythmically to catch the cats' attention, so it would come and investigate. He could only hope that the animal would come out alone. He now wished that he had the Marauder's Map on him, for it was moments as such that they had invented it in the first place. James decided that he regretted leaving it when he, Sirius, Peter and Remus had last made an excursion to the Whomping Willow.

It was about half an hour later, when James was dozing off whilst trying to come up with a better tactic that he heard something. It was a familiar sort of cracking, swooshing, rustling sound, and yet he couldn't place it. However he knew he had heard, perhaps even produced it many times before. James looked around in anticipation and came face to face with a curious cat. James grinned, for that had taken him much less time than he had presumed. The cat seemed to be crinkling its eyes in suspicion, the square-shaped rings around which James had never noticed before, seemed to be furrowing in what was quite a familiar way. James figured that at any point now it would go and somehow announce those suspicions to its owner. James gripped his wand more firmly than before and pointed it at the cat, through the fabric. He really was glad that his ancestors were the famous Peverell's, for otherwise he wouldn't be the owner of the best Invisibility Cloak in the world. Previously owned by Death himself even!

"Stupefy!" James cast in a loud whisper. The cat fell in dead weight against the floor, and James heard a scuffling noise from a nearby room to which he identified to be Filch's own. James grabbed the cat by the tail and sprinted all the way back to his room, anticipating the reactions of his friends, as Mrs Norris swayed to a fro in his hand.

As he reached Gryffindor tower, James ripped off his cloak, for only the Marauders and Marlene knew about it, and he certainly didn't want the Head Girl to know of one of the secrets to his success. After complimenting violet, who had winked flirtily at him, he marched through the door, with a victorious grin on his face, shifting the cat so he was now holding it by the scuff of its neck, in plain view of everyone.

Everyone laughed at the sight of James, and Marlene whooped and cheered in response, as Sirius collected a couple of Knut's from a doleful Remus.

"How did you do it?" Hestia wondered, not hiding how impressed she was.

James held up the tin of food for them all to see, before he banished it to their bin. "All in a day's work," He replied, feigning bows, as Mary took the stiff cat from him.

"What are we supposed to do with it now?" She asked, trying to smooth down its hairs.

"Well… I didn't really think that far ahead when I dared James," admitted Frank.

"Won't Filch come looking for her?" Lily had finished laughing and was now looking dubiously at the cat.

Remus started to formulate a reply, but he was cut off by Mary, who sounded horrified, "I doubt it."

"What?" Alice asked lazily.

"I think he will, Mary," Sirius said. "Why, I'd be more surprised if the old nutter hadn't forged marriage papers for that cat of his-"

"Is that even legal?" Peter asked.

Sirius shrugged carelessly before continuing. "Of course he will look," Sirius replied breezily. "But not here."

Mary didn't bother to reply to Sirius as she instead held up the cat for them all to see, her eyes not leaving it, still horror-struck.

Alice's eyes flickered up in a way that made it clear that one A.M. was much too late for her. Something must have caught her interest, for she gasped and stood up for a closer look. "It isn't…?"

"I think it is," Mary whispered back fretfully.

There was a few seconds silence as everyone focused their eyes in on the cat, trying to see what was wrong with it.

"I didn't kill it, did I?" James asked, worried.

"No- it's not that," Alice muttered, leaning back slightly from the cat, as though it would be bad luck to touch it.

"What is it then?" Frank asked his girlfriend.

"More like who," Lily gasped as she came to the conclusion. She practically whispered it and so it was only Remus, who she had ended up sitting next to, who hear it. Something seemed to click inside him as he leant forward to get a closer look, soon followed by Lily, who too, seemed a little scared to go near the animal.

"Oh my Merlin," Lily muttered. Everyone watched her as if she was going to give something away, or start yelling at James for his stupidity, but she did something nobody expected. She burst out into raucous laughter, the kind that made you grip your belly in laughter. As Alice looked at her, confused at first, but she soon followed suit and toppled off her chair as she did so. Remus started laughing too, although more at the sight of the other too, but soon he also found that he could not stop, for the whole situation was so absurd. Mary, however, sat holding that cat at arm's length as though she had been petrified.

"Only – you – Potter!" Lily gasped as she wiped away the tears that were streaming down her face.

"What is it Lily?" Hestia asked impatiently, as she found herself giggling at the sight of her rolling friends.

Lily sat up, trying to compose herself. "Only you could go on a dare to capture Mrs Norris and bring back Mc-Mc-"

Lily couldn't finish the sentence for she had made the mistake to look back at the cat and noticed the black hair of the cat. Mrs Norris had dusty grey. It was a fairly easy mistake yet such a huge one at the same time. However Lily's words seemed to have been enough for everybody else to suddenly understand what had happened, and they too shrieked with laughter. Even Mary had started giggling, however weakly. All except James, who took the Animagus from Mary and rotated it around in circles, staring agape at it, dumbfounded.

"Professor McGonagall?" James asked himself aloud as the laughter died down, and everyone was left in that post-laughter hiccup state. "How didn't I notice?"

"Were the spectacle rings around its eyes not enough of a giveaway?" chuckled Sirius. "Or perhaps its colour?"

As everyone took a proper look at the animal, and it actually melted in that whatever the reason for which he had done it, they were holding Professor McGonagall captive, and in the palms of their hand.

"She'll wake up soon," Lily said, breaking the silence. "I doubt you put a very strong stunner on her?"

"No, I don't think so," replied James distractedly, as he continued to swivel McGonagall around, as though he would find some unforeseen answer.

"You could just put another stunner on her?" Marlene suggested.

"She's pretty old," Lily replied, her face screwed up in concentration. "I don't think we should take any chances."

In the absurdity of the situation, Lily's serious comment was met with rather weak giggles.

"Why doesn't James just run her back and leave her there to wake up?" Peter suggested.

"That's rather cowardly," Marlene replied scornfully.

"Yeah, as much as I hate to say it," James replied thoughtfully. "It's my fault she's in this state; I can't leave her like this now, can I? I'll need to wake her up." James looked up, his eyes settling on Lily's as though asking for permission. He chuckled as he read her expression, "Don't look so surprised. I can be mature," he puffed out his chest as though to prove his point and Lily half-giggled, half-shook her head, unsure of what to reply.

Tonight she had seen a side to James Potter to which she had had glimpses of in the past, but had never fully experienced. Usually he was so _fake_ around her, but she didn't know why. Lily felt that the James she had gotten to know tonight was a whole different person, but she somehow knew that this was what he was usually like, underneath the façade. If he kept this up and put a stop to the immaturity and cockiness then she would perhaps be able to become friends with the new-James. If he did, then she would do as he had requested in the past, and stop being so uptight and judgemental around him. It was a two way thing, Lily decided. But it would be best for their Head Student position if they could, and so Lily was willing to give it a try.

"What do we do now then?" Alice asked, shivering. Lily, noticing that her friend was cold nipped to her dormitory in search of a blanket. Reality was settling in and they knew they had to do something, and fast.

"Guess I've got to take her back, haven't I?" James asked rather woefully as he stood up. James sighed as he looked down at the cat in his hands and started walking towards the door as he heard Sirius' voice.

"Someone should go with him." He said. "Filch will have undoubtedly alerted the teachers and anybody else within a 100 meter radius that Mrs Norris is missing, and although they probably couldn't care less, they'll have no choice but to go looking. Plus, this is all of our faults. I'll volunteer?"

"If you go with him, and you get caught, then McGonagall or whoever catches you will be more suspicious. Sirius Black and James Potter, the gruesome twosome, you know?" Frank countered, oblivious to the fact that James had an invisibility cloak.

"I'll go," Remus offered, "I don't mind?"

"No, if you were found then they'd have a similar reaction to Potter and Black," Frank argued.

"I'm a prefect though, it's a better alibi than those two," Remus shot back.

"He wasn't saying that Black should go instead of you," Alice said gently. "Frank meant that James should go with one us girls, much less suspicious than a duo of Marauders around after hours."

"Who though?"

"Me." Lily offered. Everyone looked at her, half surprised that she'd offer herself up to break rules, half shocked that she'd willingly help James. Lily began to feel uncomfortable under the gaze of everyone. "Look, Marlene's just as suspicious as the Marauders, Alice is practically asleep, Hestia, well, anybody would probably assume the two of you were returning from a romp in a broom cupboard, and it's obvious that Mary doesn't particularly want to. All of the teachers know full well of mine and James' gory history," everyone laughed. "So they wouldn't that we were up to anything, I have a good reputation and we're the head students. We have plenty of excuses." Nobody could argue with Lily's reasoning. "So it's settled? James and I go?"

"I still say I should go alone," James tried, "If anyone were to get in trouble because of me-"

"Not like we haven't done that before is it, mate?" Sirius laughed. "Stop being a martyr."

"James, a martyr?" Lily asked. "When did this revelation happen?"

"Always has been," Remus laughed. "If he ever contributes even the tiniest bit to a prank and it blows up in our faces, it'll be him trying to take the punishment. That's just one example."

James tried to catch Sirius' eye. Upon doing so, Sirius seemed to understand why he had tried to catch his attention and cocked his head. James knew his best friend well enough to know what he was asking: 'do you have your Cloak?' James nodded his head slightly in response and Sirius stood up, ignoring the protests of others and announced that it was he who would return McGonagall with James. James himself was rather glad of the fact; for he didn't want to show Lily his Invisibility Cloak, and yet there was no way that they could have successfully returned her without it. However, if he hadn't of been in ownership of it, Lily would have been his best chance, and felt himself smile at the fact that she had even offered. They were improving.

"Before they go, shouldn't he ask someone, pass the turn on? Quite a while has gone by, and according to our treaty, someone has to have another dare." Remus pointed out, quieting the group's objections. He understood why his best friends had decided to go together.

"Right, good idea," James said distractedly. "You then. Moony, truth or dare?"

"Me? Dare." Remus decided. Then he thought about what he had just agreed to. With James. "I shouldn't have said that."

"Lupin…," James pondered. "I dare you to take a girl of your choice into another room until I get back… and during the time your lips must touch at least once."

Remus groaned. "James, you're such a prick."

"Hey, I'm doing you a favour mate!"

Lily looked at the cat which had been left on the table, and then up at James. "You two should go now." She passed the cat to James and he did exactly that.

Remus looked around the room. Marlene, Mary, Hestia and Alice were left.

Frank wrapped a protective round around Alice and tugged her in. "You can count Alice out," He said to Remus, giving him a teasingly pointed look. Frank knew that Remus would never do that to him anyway.

'Okay,' Remus thought. 'So that leaves Marlene, Hestia and Mary.' Hestia, because of Sirius, was out of bounds. Marlene was like a sister to him and all of the Marauders, he decided it would be pretty incest of them if their lips were to touch. Remus turned to look at Mary. She was pretty, in an innocent way that most boys overlooked in comparison to the glowing beauty of Lily, or the typically gorgeous blonde Hestia. He had never overlooked her though, and had always been rather interested in her. In both senses of the word. He could tell, that alike him, she kept her past hidden and that had always intrigued him. Mary always seemed closed up around his boisterous friends, but whenever they got the opportunity to talk alone, she opened up to him and he had found that she could really hold a conversation and they had quite a lot in common really. He'd never really acted on his feelings though because his feelings weren't very pronounced, and if they did ever go out, Remus sensed it would probably be quite awkward.

He held out his hand to Mary, praying inside that she wouldn't turn his offer down. It would be so humiliating. She looked bashfully up at him through her fringe. She hesitantly placed her hand in his and he felt himself let out a sigh of relief as he smiled at her. Remus led Mary over to the door which led out of the Common Room, ignoring the wolf whistles that Sirius and Peter were emitting. James had dared him to take the girl into another room, right? He wasn't going to go give his friends the satisfaction of taking Mary into James' private bedroom.

Remus dropped her hand as he turned to close the door properly. Remus then cast a couple of spells on the room and turned around to find Mary sat on the bed, looking at him inquisitively.

"Locked the door magically," Remus explained. "Alohomora should open it but it'll give us time to… whatever, it'll let us know if they're trying to open it. I also cast 'muffliato.' It's one where you-"

"The one where nobody can hear your conversations," Mary finished for him.

"That's right," Remus replied, quite awkwardly.

"Severus showed it to Lily, and she taught us." Mary explained. "Why, what were you thinking they'd hear?"

As soon as she had asked the question, Mary wanted to kick herself. How obvious could you get? Remus looked at her at first in surprise at her forwardness, and then in embarrassment at her half suggestion.

"I didn't mean it like that," Mary tried to explain, before she stopped, realising that she was only embarrassing herself further.

"No, it's okay," Remus laughed. She was positively cute. "And to answer your question, I don't really know why I did…"

"You just didn't want to give Sirius the satisfaction of being able to hear us?" Mary quipped.

"Took the words right out of my mouth," Remus nodded and grinned. "How is it that you're always doing that?"

"I'm an observant person," Mary laughed. "I know you pretty well now, and could tell what you were thinking."

"Either that or you were thinking it too?" Remus laughed going to sit next to her.

"That too," Mary smiled.

"See, I guess I must be a pretty observant person too." Remus mused. "Another thing we have in common.

Mary blushed and looked down, letting her hair shield her face so that he couldn't read her expression.

"Why are you always doing that?" Remus asked gently.

"Doing what?" Mary asked, not meeting his eyes.

"That," Remus said, gesturing to her composure. "Retreating inside of yourself as soon as things get a bit…"

"Uncomfortable?" Mary offered weakly.

"I was going to say heated," Remus replied quietly.

"Heated?" Mary asked precariously.

Remus didn't answer her just yet, but instead he took a step towards her and lifted her chin so that she was looking at him once again. "There's no telling when James and Lily are going to be back," Remus whispered. They were about five inches away from each other now, and Mary's heart was beating out of her chest. It really was a wonder that he hadn't heard it already.

"Knowing Lily, they'll probably try to get the job done quickly," Mary breathed back, unconsciously leaning in a bit further. It was his warm homey scent that was drawing in, Mary decided.

"I don't care about that," Remus replied, keeping Mary's eyes locked on his, not letting her look away. "I want this to be on our terms."

This was Mary's chance. She wasn't going to blow it again. "Isn't it?" She replied.

This was all Remus needed to know that she was okay with the dare that James had given him. Okay with the fact that it was she that he had chosen. Perhaps more than okay, but Remus wouldn't push it.

He closed the space between them and watched as Mary's eyes fluttered closed. He took his time to close the gap between them, finding that he wanted to savour the moment. He slowly pressed his lips firmly yet gently against her soft pink ones. She tasted delicious. He felt her return the kiss, before he used all of the restraint he had to pull away, smiling.

Remus pulled back and watched as Mary's grey-blue eyes opened and locked with his. She then did something that neither of them expected. She stepped forward quickly and closed the gap between them and captured his lips once more, she moved her own against his, trying for some sort of reaction. When none came, Mary began to pull away, thoroughly humiliated that she had lost her head and been so rash, but Remus seemed to come to life. He grabbed her waist to stop her getting away and pressed his mouth to hers, harder than before. The only feeling that Mary could reciprocate was intense relief, and she shifted into a more comfortable position, acutely aware that every inch of her body was pressed us against his. Remus brushed Mary's hair out of her face, and she gasped at her mere sensitivity increase. Taking the opportunity to deepen the kiss, Remus bit lightly on her upper lip and Mary pressed a hard kiss on his in return. Remus returned to what he had been doing and licked Mary's lip, asking for entrance. She pulled back slightly on impact and surprise, causing Remus to open his eyes in worry. Mary caught her breath, not answering Remus' questioning eyes, but instead kissed him with even fervour than before. The sudden energy urged Remus to flip her around so that she was now pressed up against the wall, causing her to let out a breathy giggle of pleasure. She opened her mouth slightly whilst kissing him, giving him the access he had been asking for before. She felt a strange, unfamiliar sensation as his tongue slipped into her mouth, and although she had never used tongues before, Mary found that she knew more or less what to do, especially with Remus leading the way. Remus grabbed Mary on the bum, causing a gasp to escape her. She wasn't ready for anything more. Remus adjusted his hands so that he was holding her more securely off the floor, as he adjusted his position. Mary felt relieved that he hadn't been trying it on with her, and felt silly for even presuming that Remus would do such a thing. Mary wrapped her legs around his back for more support, as Remus continued to kiss her with ferocity. Mary knew that she shouldn't have worried. She felt safe with Remus; she knew that he would never try anything like that with her. As a reaction to these protective thoughts, Mary found herself feeling more confident, and so she slowly bucked her hips against his. The groan of response she got from Remus was one of extreme pleasure – exactly what she had been aiming for. Mary smiled against his lips as Remus continues to pepper kisses there. Both were completely lost in the moment and could not have been more content.

"Well, well well. What do we have here?"

Mary gasped in surprise and tore herself away from Remus, jumping down and tugging at her skirt, which had been caught around his belt. She chanced a glance up, only to face a smirking James and Sirius. Mary took another step away from Remus, so that she was standing behind him.

"Oh, don't let us stop your fun," James grinned, trying not to laugh. It was just so uncharacteristic of the two of them!

Remus shot James a scathing look as he seemed to compose himself enough to grab his wand. He pointed it towards the door, and with a nonverbal spell it flew open to the surprise of the rest of their friends, who looked out, taking in Mary's and Remus' appearance, and the expressions on the other two's faces. Remus indicated that they go through, and his friends obliged, but not without sending them suggestive faces. Once they had entered the Common Room, the door slammed shut giving them some more privacy as they composed themselves.

"What did I say?" Sirius' voice seeped under the door. "It's always the quiet ones!"

Mary sat down on the top step and buried her face in her hands, cringing in humiliation.

She felt the step creak next to her as Remus took his place and wrapped a comforting arm around her, pulling her towards him.

"That is so embarrassing," Mary muttered into his chest.

Remus laughed. Although he couldn't say that he himself wasn't flustered, he found her embarrassment rather endearing.

"You find this funny?" Mary asked her voice muffled from the fact that her mouth was pressed up against his short, plain white, fitted pyjama top.

"No," he admitted. "But I've walked in on Sirius in much more compromising situations."

Mary lifted her face and gave him a look as if to say, 'if that supposed to fix this?'

"Besides," Remus started, trying to comfort her and convince himself. "To complete the dare they'd have known we kissed anyway,"

"But not like that," Mary replied. "What was I thinking?"

Remus was rather startled as he looked at her, an expression of worry. "Well I don't regret it," he assured her. "Do you?"

Mary looked up at him and smiled weakly, "No," she whispered. "I don't."

"Then who cares what they saw?" Remus enveloped Mary in his arms and pulled her into a strong hug, kissing the top of her forehead. As they broke apart he felt himself smirking at the sight of her. "You might want to straighten yourself out a bit."

Mary bit her lip and nodded as she looked down at herself. Her hair was a mess, her clothes were skewered, she could feel that her cheeks were flushed and her lips were much plumper than usual. Mary pulled at her top and ran her fingers through her hair, staring hopelessly at her reflection. "I think that this is as good as it's going to get."

Remus nodded towards the door, as though asking her permission to open it. Mary stood up and followed him out, the room falling silent in a bemused trance as they did so.

Everyone turned to the couple as they walked in; they had all clearly been filled on what had happened, and Mary noticed that all of her friends were looking at her in a way that said 'who are you and what have you done with Mary?' Sirius smirked as Remus coolly sat down opposite him. "_Somebody_ took advantage of the dare that James set."

Remus tried to blow it all off as confidence, trying to smother the fact that he was embarrassed whilst trying to keep the attention from Mary.

"Somebody needs to learn to mind their own business," Remus shot back as he sunk further back into the chair, before turning to Peter and offering him truth or dare.

* * *

_Thank you for reading this far! It'd mean a lot to me if you'd take thirty more seconds of your time and leave a review, just an opinion, advice, criticism; it's all welcome! Thanks for those who've already reviewed, they make me smile :-)_

_I'm back at school tomorrow and so the updates will be more frequent and regular._

_So without further ado:_

_What do you think happened in Mary's past to do with her mother? _


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